


Come Attrition, Come Hell

by InkInc



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Angst, Drama, Episode: s02e01 A Scandal in Belgravia, F/M, Friendship, Love, Reichenbach Feels, Romance, Sexual Content
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-12-05
Updated: 2016-08-31
Packaged: 2018-02-28 07:14:54
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 16
Words: 88,823
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2723462
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/InkInc/pseuds/InkInc
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Set an hour or so after the conversation in Mycroft's study in ASiB, I don't think Irene would have fled London immediately, do you?: Sherlock hadn't expected to see her, not now, not here, not after toppling her whole world… yet here she was, and he'd always remember tonight as the night something changed.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Part 1: For The Moment

**Author's Note:**

> In the author's note to my last Sherlock fic, I wrote:
> 
> "This story kept me properly obsessed for about 2 weeks, because I found that out of every bit of fan fiction I've ever written, and all the character's heads I've gotten in to, Sherlock was the absolute hardest for me to write. It was a challenge, and it was awesome. I'm already working on my next Sherlock story, and I really hope this piece sets the stage, even though I very much hope to evolve my characterizations."
> 
> I definitely find while writing this new story, that I've finally found a voice, which is to say I've finally found a way to write a version of Sherlock that resonates as authentic to me, something that had eluded me in my first foray. As I say, it's a version, seeing as how I don't fancy myself quite clever enough to ever truly get inside that head, but I do think I've succeeded in what I set out to do to begin with. As ever, I am having an inappropriate amount of fun writing this, and the obsession continues to burn on. 
> 
> As for the rating, I've never been a huge fan of overt sexuality in stories where there really was no place for it. I dabbled in it in my earlier fic writing, because that was what appeared to be popular. Since then, I've definitely adopted an attitude of, if it doesn't add anything to the story, it shouldn't be there. As far as a relationship between Sherlock and Irene goes, I think the matter of sexuality is an incredibly fascinating one, and there's every reason to explore it. I do not, however, write porn… So if that's what you've come here for, I really hope that you'll give this story a chance anyway.
> 
> If you were patient enough to read that whole thing, please understand that I love you and think you're a saint. I hope you enjoy this story!

**Come Attrition, Come Hell  
Part One**

**Chapter 1: For The Moment**

**...**

It had just started to rain as Sherlock unceremoniously exited his brother's posh home, leaving behind the older Holmes and Irene Adler to what was probably a very tedious conversation, though one his brother likely relished at that. He'd been just a hair's breadth away from crushing defeat. They both had been.

It was an eleventh hour victory, certainly, but a victory nonetheless.

Something of a victory anyway.

Sherlock pulled his collar up against the cold and the damp, and walked, what may have appeared to an observer as, absently down the street. It briefly occurred to him to hail a cab, but the rain didn't bother him, and anyway... He wasn't in a hurry to get home.

The light drops of water fell and clung to the detective's curly hair, and he vaguely wondered what it would be like living in a climate where this was not the norm, where the skies were more often blue than gray. Somewhere in America, perhaps? Somewhere in California where, like so many of its other residents, the sun was famous. He thought he should detest it, actually. This weather, this climate, his coat, and his scarf, this solitude... It was London, and it was as much a part of him as was the colour of his eyes.

Dismissing these thoughts, as they were becoming dangerously close to seeming like sentiment, something he had chided The Woman for not 15 minutes before, he took his leather gloves from his pocket, and wished to God they were a pack of cigarettes instead. God, clearly bothered by Sherlock's unequivocal disbelief in him, however, did not comply... And the gloves remained gloves as the dark haired man slipped them over his hands.

He'd won. He had clearly won... But it was an unsatisfying win. Something, he felt, that couldn't be much unlike winning a game by cheating at it. He hadn't cheated, of course, but he hadn't quite played fair, either.

He'd understood that Irene's show of interest in him, for some time, had been a smokescreen to mask her  _actual_  interest in him. It had been clear upon their first meeting that she'd known of him for quite a while longer than he had known of her, and that she'd already become something of a fan of his intellect. From the outset she'd masked her true investment with layered flirtation, hiding in plain sight, as it were... And though he couldn't precisely pinpoint when exactly he'd understood her for what she was, he  _had_  been convinced that she had, for lack of a better vocabulary on the subject, fancied him.

It wasn't until just tonight in his sitting room, however, that he had realized she was in love with him.

He'd had no particular reason for taking her pulse other than that she had presented him with the perfect opportunity. He felt the rapid beat of her heart through her wrist as soon as she placed her hand over his, and moving his fingers over her pulse point under the guise of a returning caress seemed almost the logical thing to do in that particular situation - the collecting of all available data to paint a more complete portrait. The beat quickened as he turned her wrist in his hand, and he could read everything else he needed to know in her face. He'd seen the signs so many times in others, particularly in Molly Hooper where the sentiment had been directed toward himself.

Having taken in her physiological symptoms and comparing it against what he had already known about her and experienced of her, he was satisfied in his conclusion that she had indeed fallen in love with him at some point. How he would ever find a useful application for this information, he was uncertain. In fact, it had made little difference to him whether she loved him or not, since she seemed quite keen on concealing it from him and it would likely never come in to play at all. As for his own feelings, he was left a bit amused, but on the whole at a loss as to why she'd mislaid her sentiment so absolutely. He hadn't, however, planned on using her feelings toward him against her.

She had continued her act of disinterest as she spoke to Mycroft about demands and protection, and Sherlock was inclined to let her. After all, what would have been the point in pulling the rug out from under that particular charade? She loved him, but so what? It didn't matter. It wasn't going halt her in her course, and since that would be the only outcome Sherlock was interested in from any action he chose to take, her love was, again, useless to him.

And then, of course, it wasn't.

Sherlock unconsciously clenched his hands in to fists in his pockets and shivered only slightly over the increasingly present cold. He felt... something. Anger? It was an emotion not immediately identifiable, whatever it was, and that  _alone_  was quite frustrating. Even putting aside, for a moment, the utter,  _utter_ , humiliation he had just been dealt.

He hadn't meant to use her feelings against her, no, but when the last piece of her ridiculous puzzle clicked in to place with almost painful clarity, he was unmerciful.

There was no denying now that she had succeeded in fooling him, at least insofar as he hadn't completely sensed an ulterior motive. The pretense of infatuation, while he had already identified it as a smokescreen, was also meant as a distraction. One that had worked. He could almost applaud the effort, really. It was no small task fooling him at all, and she had done it so thoroughly. It was impressive, and unforgivable.

So when the opportunity arose to tear her mask apart, his anger and cruelty were hot and swift. He was callous and precise, and even as something not unlike hatred though completely different from it as well burned in his chest, he pressed on. He wanted to be sure she understood why even the people he helped referred to him as a freak; why even the people of the city that he so often protected thought of him as a psychopath. Why  _love_  was nothing but a trap in the end even on the best of terms, but on his terms was nothing short of an atrocity.

_Love._

Sherlock's mind recoiled at the word even as he audibly scoffed. What  _had_  she been thinking of, falling in love with him? He wanted to hate her for it, and in truth he felt a deep abhorrence toward her and her sentiment toward him... but he was left wondering at why he had wanted to use it to  _hurt_  her. Why was this blight among all the many he had suffered in a lifetime of being other than what people wanted him to be so completely and horribly loathsome to him?

Why did he  _care_?

On the surface, the answer was simple, really. She had embarrassed him, and it was rather a bit unacceptable... But that wasn't the whole answer. There was something else, something that defied calculation and classification.

Suddenly, and unbidden, his thoughts turned to the night he had found The Woman's phone on his mantel. He had been certain that she was dead, and it...

He shook his head twice, violently, before he could finish his train of thought, and then held his hand out for a taxi.

* * *

After paying his cabbie, Sherlock alighted from the black cab and took a deep breath as he came to stand in front of 221B. It was, as always, a welcomed sight, and even he couldn't deny that a sense of being home was comforting.

He surveyed the door with a short glance as he always did before entering. Judging by the angle at which the doorknocker sat, the door had been opened and closed only once since his own departure, accounting for the Woman leaving a short while after him, which meant that John was still out. Sherlock was relieved, but at the same time disappointed. It wouldn't have been terrible to see a, what would someone else say?

 _A friendly face_ , his mind begrudgingly offered.

Pushing the front door open, he stepped in and wiped his feet on the mat in the foyer unconsciously. He looked through the foggy glass of the interior door for a moment, his gaze empty and distracted, before pushing through to head up the 17 steps to his flat.

But he stopped at the foot of the stairs. Immediately a wave of adrenaline crashed against him so suddenly and intensely that he had to close his eyes against it.

She was here.

Mycroft; an even more unforgiving and unrelenting foe than himself. He had let her go, with all the knowledge of what exactly that meant for her. She had committed treason, to be sure, and should have been on her way to prison, or to her own public beheading (though, unfortunately, Britain was no longer in the practice of publicly beheading its traitors), but instead Mycroft had released her back in to the wild to be cannibalized by what he may have classed as "her own sort." It was cruel, in a way, but more calculated than that. It was a move to show that she could not hope to find protection here, certainly not in England, but most likely not in the whole of the UK. Not even in the form of a prison cell. Perhaps had a different government official been in a position to make that decision, or perhaps if Mycroft had not been Mycroft  _Holmes,_  it would have been different. But it wasn't different.

Sherlock's eyes opened and his jaw set as his gaze traveled slowly up the steps. For someone who prided himself on knowing a person's next move before they even knew it themself, he found that it was rather startling to be presented with the fact that he hadn't  _expected_ The Woman to come here. He hadn't expected to be confronted with seeing her again so soon after  _toppling her whole world_. In hindsight, it was obvious, really, that she should turn up here if his brother (as he  _had_  anticipated) let her go. Everything that he knew of her behavior thus far through their association, the patterns she adhered to, the fact that she  _loved_  him, made her appearance here tonight a glaring inevitability, but one that he had  _still_ missed.

He was clearly off his game, which was not a little disconcerting, because his game was more than just a set of exceptional observational skills; it was  _who he was_. Being startled, being confused, being emotional, being so deeply moved to feeling so many times in one night and in instances so close in proximity to one another made him feel foreign in his own body. And through it all the sense of betrayal was coming through louder and clearer than anything he had yet felt... but it wasn't betrayal by Irene Adler. Betrayal implied an already established trust, and a belief that something was intrinsically one way and _not_  another... And though he had believed Irene's story in part, he had always assumed that he was not seeing quite to the core of who she was or what she wanted. There had been no trust lost there.

Sherlock Holmes felt he had betrayed himself.

With a deep breath, he began the climb up the steps, his hand running along the wall to his left. He didn't know what real reason she could have for coming here, couldn't even  _conceive_  of a reason for it, seeing as how their business with each other was permanently settled, but there was no mistaking the scent of her perfume wafting down to meet him as he ascended. It was ingrained in his memory as his coat had carried the fragrance for some days after she had returned it to him following their first meeting. It was something very near to horrible to him now, and he both hated it and was entranced by it in equal measure, though he was grateful, at least, that it had given him a "heads-up" as to her presence. He was preparing himself with each step he took, consciously focusing his his breathing until it was even and steady, collecting his thoughts and his wits.

By the time Sherlock made it to the landing, he had regained a substantial amount of his normal calm collectedness. He pulled the gloves from his hands and returned them to his coat pocket as he tread slowly to his room. The door had been left slightly ajar, and the soft glow of his bedside lamp was visible. If The Woman knew he was here, she made no announcement of it.

He didn't know why he should feel any apprehension at all in this moment. This was, after all, his home,  _his domain._  If London was his kingdom, then 221B was inextricably his castle, and his mind his palace... but he nonetheless felt a measure of uncertainty as he made it to his door. Pushing it open the rest of the way, he stepped in.

Something inside of him gave pause for a microsecond; not long enough to be of detriment, but just long enough to throw a warning.

There she was, just as he knew she would be, sitting at the end of his bed, staring at the wall in front of her. Her hair was down again, though she still wore the black dress she had been in earlier. She didn't turn to look at him. She didn't move at all.

"Back to your  _not_  evil hair again, I see." Sherlock said carelessly as he closed his door slightly to gain access to the hook behind it. He unraveled his scarf first, and then shrugged off his coat, hanging both items across the door as he spoke. "Is there a switch at the back of your neck for that?"

"He's going to kill me now." The Woman spoke softly, though it didn't seem as though she was addressing Sherlock at all. For his part, he nearly froze at the words, but was able to turn to look at her instead.

"What are you doing here?" He asked.

She turned to him at that, and Sherlock was able to clearly observe the streaks in her makeup, and the red tinge to her eyes and nose. She had been crying, sobbing, in fact, and rather convulsively. The soft and impermanent lines that had already begun to fade around her mouth and eyes, however, made it clear that she had been calm for at least an hour. Had she been here that long? He told himself that it was immaterial, that it was _all_  immaterial, though he didn't much care for the tightening in his chest, and was thankful that he didn't feel necessarily inclined to analyze the reason for it.

"This is the safest place for me at the moment." Was her simple response.

 _At the moment_. Well, there was an implication there, obviously.

"Lovely." Sherlock answered flatly as he undid his jacket button and crossed the room to his dresser over which he emptied the meager contents of his pocket - a business card and his mobile - quietly turning over a small framed photo of he and his brother as children, that always sat atop the wooden chest of drawers, as he did so. He wasn't sure why it bothered him that The Woman might see it, and furthermore he knew it was likely that she already had, but he turned it over anyway. "And where might that be in the  _next_  moment? Somewhere else, I can only hope." He annunciated the "p" in "hope" more than was absolutely necessary.

"Of course." The Woman said almost conversationally. "He'll know to look for me here."

Sherlock faced her, though she continued to stare at his wall.

"In my bedroom?" He asked with an even, almost bored tone.

"In London." She responded, finally looking at him.

Sherlock stared blankly for a moment.

"Yes. I can't imagine that you've made many friends in London while...  _misbehaving_."

She visibly flinched.

"Only you."

Admittedly, like her appearance here, he wasn't expecting that.

Sherlock was silent as he examined her face and contemplated her words and their meaning. Honestly, there was a bit to wade through here. Firstly, and perhaps most importantly, who was this "he" to which she was referring? The detective had 3 theories, 2 of which made substantially less sense than the last, and so he was left relatively assured the last was correct.

Her association with James Moriarty had come as something of a surprise to him, though now the different pieces, too scattered for him to have seen the way they fit together before, were now falling in to place. It had been her call about the undecipherable email that had saved his and John's lives at the pool, though she most likely hadn't been aware of it at the time. That didn't matter, though. What mattered was that Moriarty  _was_  aware of the secrets and information tucked away in her camera phone, some of them presumably pertaining to several of his... projects. Nothing definitive, of course; the man Sherlock had met at the pool that night had not been a negligent one, so nothing on the phone would lead directly to him. It would, however, be a very unwelcomed irritant.

It was only a matter of time before he knew that Mycroft had gained access to Irene's files, and a matter of probability that he would have her killed if only because she was a loose end and useless to him now.

"You can't hide here." He said finally, completely passing over her comment, unwilling to rise to it. "Given your profile and the nature of the information you've been holding, it's unlikely your whereabouts will remain unknown for long, if at all."

The Woman stood, though made no move to leave, and she seemed somehow completely changed from the confident dominatrix that had almost brought the Holmes brothers to their knees. Sherlock found himself vaguely trying to reconcile this version of her with the version he'd been presented with on all other occasions, and it became apparent to him that this was the real Irene Adler. The Woman when all the pretense had been stripped away. He wanted to think her ordinary and dull like everyone else at the revelation, but the truth was this didn't alter his opinion of her at all.

"Do you hate me so much?" She asked, her face setting itself into lines of obvious distress, though Sherlock assumed it wasn't exactly in connection to what she had just said.

"Hate you?" He asked, his mouth quirking in to a very small and dangerous grin as he took a step toward her. "I don't feel anything for you."

 _Still trying to hurt her?_  Something inside of him prodded through the new and strange ache behind his ribcage.  _Why?_

"Moriarty will know-"

Sherlock dismissed her words with an impatient wave of his hand, wordlessly telling her she needn't explain the situation to him - though he did feel a vague sense of satisfaction at having accurately assessed who "he" was.

Irene tightened her jaw, her eyes glossing over anew.

"He  _will_ kill me... I gave myself 6 months." She continued. Sherlock raised his chin, observing her from beneath lowered eyelids. "I was being very generous."

The low boil of frustration building up inside of Sherlock was now a familiar one. It was the dissatisfaction at having a particularly difficult puzzle dangled in front of him, only to be confronted with the fact that he didn't possess the necessary tools to solve it. He knew next to nothing about Jim Moriarty, and this was quite the crude reminder of that. He didn't like being in the dark. He didn't like being made to feel as though he didn't  _understand_.

"And you've come to me, for what?" Sherlock ground out neatly. " _Protection_?"

"No, Mr. Holmes. My protection was ripped away from me tonight, and there is no help for me now." She sounded angry, and justifiably frightened. The return to the formal address was interesting as well, though he wasn't exactly sure why he thought so. "My life depended on the information on that phone, and it was worth everything,  _everything_  to me. It was worth your pride and my feelings... What good is my heart if I'm dead?"

 _Ah_ , Sherlock thought as something became clear to him, though not necessarily in response to her question.  _You_ hurt _me._

It was a deeply mortifying realization, but one that he could not deny. She had brought up her impending death in the context of her feelings toward him, and he could not refrain from remembering his own feelings for her in the context of her earlier perceived death. It was what he was thinking just before he hailed the cab home.

He had been certain that she was dead, and it had  _hurt_  him.

Extrapolating from there, it was impossible to ignore the plain fact that she had hurt him again earlier tonight, and that's why he had wanted to hurt her... Which was, in itself, an unconscious admission of his own regard.

Something about this line of thought was, he felt, inherently dangerous to him, and since it was neither relevant nor useful, he managed to push it away and keep the strain from showing on his face. The only notable proof that he was fighting an internal conflict at all was that his breathing had become markedly more shallow, and his face had gone a tad paler.

"The only help I can offer, and the only help you can expect," he started, staring down at her, meaning his words incontrovertibly. "-Is advice to run. Run now, and far, and keep running, because you  _were_  right."

She watched him silently, seemingly appraising every movement of his face and every nuance of his words.

"6 months was incredibly generous." He finished, his mouth pressing together in something that was half grimace, half sneer.

He crossed behind her toward the door, though he wasn't exactly sure what he meant to do once he got there. Was he just going to pop out in to the study, pour himself a nice cuppa', and wait until she politely let herself out? All he knew was that he wanted her gone, even if gone meant that she was headed off to die, because then he would finally be  _rid_  of her-

Sherlock halted abruptly with his hand outstretched toward the door at that thought... because even in his state of acute agitation, he could recognize palpable discomfort at the idea that she should die, and what's more, that she should die because of him.

He screwed his eyes shut for a moment before blinking them rapidly, and then slowly, moving them from side to side as though examining the carpet beneath him.

"It wouldn't have mattered to you in a month's time." The Woman's voice, strained, came from behind him. He furrowed his forehead slightly, dropping his hand back to his side, and turning to look at her in bemusement. She swallowed, and one thick tear dropped from each of her eyes in unison. Sherlock felt, more than observed, that a change was taking place, and one that he didn't think would be altogether a good one. "I would have gotten what I wanted, my  _protection_. Everything I worked for, as you aptly put it. I would have disappeared." She shook her head.

"And what would it have cost you?" Her eyes narrowed slightly as she continued and looked him up and down with a judging and accusatory glare without moving her head. "Your older brother's temporary scorn. Some embarrassment. A loss. One loss against how many wins?" Tears, again. Sherlock swallowed, and his mouth felt uncomfortably dry. "You guessed what I felt, and then you threw me to the wolves, and for what?"

He opened his mouth to speak, but found, for once, that he had nothing to say.

"You were trying to save face in front of the cleverer Holmes in that room, and I was fighting for my life. You weighed one against the other and chose your pride over my life, because the only belief you have is in yourself, and you-"

These were vicious, unfiltered words, not necessarily in content, but certainly in subtext, even if they were being spoken in a relatively calm and unbroken cadence. There was venom there that hadn't been present minutes earlier... And the effect it had on him was significant, both because of the resentment she was inspiring within him, and because he was very suddenly feeling something precariously similar to guilt for perhaps only the second or third time in his life.

"Me?"

The Woman jumped slightly. He had meant only to make a placid interjection, but somehow it had come out as a coarse shout. He could have taken a moment to compose himself, but... didn't. He stalked toward Irene, closing the gap between the two of them.

"I didn't ask for you. I didn't ask for any of this." He intoned with his own venom, his voice darker and lower than it had been even in Mycroft's study. "You're a grown woman, Irene, or need I remind you that it was of your own volition that you chose to consult a psychopath about matters of potential national importance?" He grabbed her around the wrist, and she gasped up at him in surprise. "Did you think this was all going to end in a tea party at the National Gallery?" His eyes became two dark slits contrasted against the pallor of his face, his mouth turning in a twisted smile. "No, you knew what he was, and what he was capable of.  _You_  weighed your life against the whole of the country, and found the country wanting."

He burned his gaze in to hers for only a moment longer before releasing his grasp on her. She closed her eyes against the new onslaught of tears that fell, and sat heavily back down on the bed. Sherlock only stared forward.

"You came here wanting my aid or my mercy." He went on in a decidedly cooler, but no less hateful, tone. "I am neither willing to offer, nor am I capable of offering, either."

He looked down at her slumped figure, her hair falling in a mess around her face, obscuring her expression from view. He didn't need to see it to know that it was obvious to her now that she was defeated, and completely alone.

If he had been any other man, this was the moment he would have relented to her - given her anything and everything she asked for. Seeing her so thoroughly vulnerable and exposed was nothing short of gut wrenching - a term he had never had cause to apply to any situation, and one that he was intensely startled, if not horrified to have applied now... yet there it was. If he were any other man, she would have been in his arms, and he would be promising his life away to her just for the hope of taking her grief away... But he wasn't any other man, and so he merely swallowed the lump in his throat and said:

"Know... when you are beaten."

She looked up at him suddenly, her eyes as wide and wild as a frightened child's, her cheeks flushed in a deep crimson. Sherlock's breath caught in his chest.

"Do you?" She asked cryptically.

"What?" He asked trying to sound put out, though the look of confusion on his face probably betrayed him.

"Jim Moriarty is just as clever as you, and what do you think a man with your calculating intelligence would do if he were criminally mad?" Sherlock said nothing, but continued to look on as Irene straightened her shoulders. "He wants to burn the world down, Sherlock, and for no other reason than that he  _can_. I'll be out of the way soon enough, but then I never really mattered. I shudder to think what it would be like to  _matter_  to him."

The insinuation was clear, that he - that Sherlock - mattered... And what was clearer was that her appraisal of the situation was nothing but correct, right along with each dubious meaning the word "mattered" implied. He had heard Moriarty tell the very woman who sat before him that he would find her and skin her if she had been lying to him over the phone, and he had an overall feeling that the man wasn't being figurative.

"I think I've well proven that I can handle myself." Sherlock responded quietly, though he was shaken, and probably visibly at that.

Irene smirked, though it held no warmth.

"You're going to fall." She said blithely. "And I only hope that I live at least long enough to see it."

That... stung, and since it was likely meant to, he was loath to accept that it did.

Sherlock bit down.

"And if you had chosen a different passcode, perhaps you might have... but now we'll never know."

He regretted the words almost immediately, which was another of his feelings rarely visited upon. For her part, oddly, The Woman looked abruptly more detached than she had even when he'd first entered the room.

"No, we won't, will we?" She murmured, though it did not even appear to be directed at Sherlock at all.

An excruciatingly long moment passed before Sherlock ran his hand impatiently through his hair and began to pace the room. This was just... unacceptable. The whole messy affair. He had never pictured himself the star of his own bloody soap opera, yet here was a beautiful and damaged woman sitting forlorn on his bed, and the compulsion to hold her until that look was well gone out of her eyes was becoming more and more urgent as each second went by.

How could he let her leave?  _How_? But how could he let her stay?

Neither was possible. Neither was conceivable.

Sherlock hadn't noticed Irene's intent eyes fixed upon him as he paced until she reached out at his hand, halting him mid step. He looked down in to her face, her dark blue stare shining bright with tears and pain, and he was undone.

There were very few moments in Sherlock's life that he would categorize as "defining." The first time he had come to a conclusion before Mycroft had, and therefor the first time he realized he could perhaps be just as clever as his older brother, was one. The moment he realized he cared for John Watson was another...

And then there was this. A moment that, for reasons completely eluding him, he knew he would look back on with the certainty that this was when something had changed for him - completely and absolutely.

"Sherlock-"

His name hung in the air as he sunk to his knees in front of Irene, his hands desperately cradling her on either side of her head, and pressed his lips to hers in a frenzied kiss that, he understood now, was probably always going to happen.

The ground was dropping out from underneath him now, he knew, but as always when The Woman was involved, he was quite at a loss as to how to stop it.

**...**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In the DVD commentary for ASiB, Moffat made a joke about how Irene's hair in the Coventry conversation scene was her "not evil hair", and I liked it so much I had to have Sherlock say it. :)
> 
> The next chapter is going to pick up a little differently, but I'm jumping around the timeline of Sherlock and Irene's relationship quite a bit in this story. I don't think linearly, so I don't write that way either!


	2. Contrition

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow, thank you so much to everyone's who's read and encouraged me to keep writing this story. I have to admit that I'm a bit nervous about posting this new chapter. I really hope that I don't let anyone down!
> 
> This next part has a lot of John Watson in it, and a whole lot of plot set up. It was necessary, and I wanted to get it out of the way early on (though, I admit, I had a terribly large amount of fun writing it). Like I mentioned in my farewell note on my last chapter, I'm jumping slightly around the timeline of Irene and Sherlock's relationship, which you'll see a bit of here, but it'll be more extreme in chapters to come. As for the story arc, I'd like to make it clear that any plot development is really just a device to explore my version of the Irene/Sherlock dynamic, so if you're a fan of that relationship, you're in the right place!
> 
> Lastly, I would like to write this so that it's plausible all the events that take place in this story could have happened between the time we last see Irene in Mycroft's study, and the time Sherlock rescues her in Kirachi. We'll see how well I can pull that off.
> 
> Again, thank you to everyone who's read this story so far. I hope you enjoy the new installment!

**Chapter 2: Contrition**

**...**

  **One Month Later**  

"No, no. You're not _listening_."

 He was irritated. Often times explaining things to people who did not understand them was something of a balm. Something that soothed his need for completion and solution. Explaining things, and doing it in a way that another person would comprehend, was something of a puzzle in itself. How to break something down to its slowest moving parts so that others could see the mechanisms, the subtleties, and the nuances... It was something close to a hobby.

 But this? This was like talking to a child.

 "Sherlock..." John Watson intoned almost warningly, but still with a forced smile on his face as he kept his eyes on their client. The curly haired man continued on with an almost manic rush of tone and gesture, ignoring his side-kick completely.

 "If she merely ran away, there would be a paper trail. People _always_ leave trails, especially someone who fancies herself clever, but isn't. The margin for error is always significant."

"Sherlock..." Watson said again.

 Sherlock shot his friend a peevish glance. What? What did he want? Couldn't he see? Why couldn't they _see_? 

"Oh, come on. It's obvious." Sherlock sneered, pausing mid pace as he gestured at the girl sitting on the wooden chair in front of them, then addressed his tirade at her. "You don't like your father; you assume your mother ran away to escape him, probably they've been fighting. You're wearing a shirt with Einstein screen printed on the front, and I may be a bit out of the loop here, but I'm reasonably certain that Einstein isn't exactly a pop culture icon. It's an interest you've picked up from your mother, the favorite of your two parents, probably worn today as an unconscious homage. She likes Einstein, but isn't a scientist herself. She's interested in physics but writes romance novels--"  
  
"How could you possibly--"  
  
"The book." Sherlock interrupted Watson impatiently, pointing at the book that poked out from the girl's bag on the floor next to her feet, and then began typing in to his phone which was already in his hand as he had been texting Detective Inspector Lestrade for the better part of this consultation. "Clarke, same surname. Written by her mother. So, she's a writer, and holds a passing interest in the sciences - clearly she thinks she's clever, people interested in science always do, but clearly she isn't; writers never really are. If she'd run away, she would have left behind clues. An empty bank account. Credit card charges. A hired car. But there's nothing."

 John held his hand out in a "calm down now" gesture.

"I'm sorry, how do you know there's nothing?" He asked.

Sherlock quirked his mouth in to a knowing smile, and laughed shortly.  
  
"Please." He said. "What do you think I was doing on my phone this whole time, reading up on what the King's had for breakfast? Lestrade has access to these sorts of records, and I have access to Lestrade."

 John smiled almost blankly, a strain showing through that he likely was trying to hide.

 "We don't have-- Listen, is that... even legal?" He asked incredulously.

 Legal. Well, that was funny.

"Not in the strictest sense, no, but you'd be surprised how often legality impedes justice."

"Then where is my mum?" The young client interjected suddenly, tears brimming her eyes.  
  
Sherlock looked up from his phone and felt just the smallest bit of surprise at the fact that she was even still there, as he no longer needed to hear anything more from her. Life would be a lot more convenient if people knew when their usefulness had run its course.  
  
"Dead, of course." He looked back down for a moment, before suddenly looking up again. "And I'll take the case." He finished, almost as an afterthought.

 John slowly covered his eyes with his hand as the two elder people who sat on the sofa behind their 11-year-old granddaughter stood angrily.

"How dare you say such a thing to a little girl?" The old woman demanded.  
  
"Dead?" The girl asked, her voice pitched high. "She can't be dead!"

 "Why can't she?" Sherlock asked, narrowing his eyes, wondering if maybe she had more to offer than what she had already given. "Do be specific."

 The girl swallowed.

"Because--" Her voice caught, and tears began rolling down her eyes. "Because she's my mum."  
  
Sherlock's expression softened as he realized that he'd missed something again - that he'd completely and _utterly_ missed something. He couldn't just speak that bluntly to a child, could he? There were societal rules about that sort of thing; there always were. He didn't necessarily understand it, given that he didn't think there was anything particular to protect in a child, seeing as how an ignorant small human would eventually grow to nothing more than an ignorant large one... but the expression that now spread over Emma Clarke's face in conjunction with the words she had just spoken alerted him quite conclusively to that fact that he had done something cruel. That hadn't been his intention, of course, but then it never was. He looked over at his friend contritely, or rather as contritely as the nature of who he was would allow him to be. John merely pursed his lips with a small shake of his head, but didn't return Sherlock's glance.

"Come along." The old woman said, taking hold of her granddaughter’s arm and gently pulling her up from the chair as her husband opened the door for the two of them.

"Please, Mr. Holmes." The girl implored one last time before being pushed out of the room, though Sherlock could hear the rest of her desperate plea from the steps. "You said you took the case. Please find her..."

Emma's grandfather remained in the doorway, his face hard and his eyes dark.

"With a reputation like yours, I can hardly pretend to be surprised." He said in a low, shaking voice. "But psychopath isn't the right word, Mr. Holmes. It's far too kind for what you are." He gestured toward John and nodded curtly before leaving the room after his wife and granddaughter.   
  
John took a deep breath and then stood. Sherlock's eyes remained averted.  
  
"I can see how I could have handled that--"  
  
"She's _just_ a little girl, Sherlock!" his friend ground out angrily. Now Sherlock did meet John's eyes, finding it not humorous, but interesting that John thought it necessary to chide him even though he had already begun to admit that he had understood that he had been out of line - or at least that he understood that everyone else in the room thought he had been out of line. "You couldn't have--" He shook his head, cutting himself off. "Even now. How am I still capable of being shocked by _you_?" He finished, looking over Sherlock with an almost impressed disdain.

Sherlock silently held John's gaze for moment before holding out his phone so that his friend could see the screen.  
  
"Thomas Clarke." He said flatly, deciding that he didn't have time for contrition. The little girl was gone, the grandparent's were already angry, and it all amounted to nothing in the end. If other people wanted to go around constantly regretting their behavior and lamenting the fact that they couldn't make amends - or even feeling that they deserved their friends' unsolicited judgment, then that was their cross to bear. He couldn't, nor did he want to, make himself feel as sorry as John seemed to think he should, and that would always be one of the many fundamental differences between the two of them. John cared, and that made life just a little bit harder on him every single day. Sherlock, on the other hand, had only a small collection of people that he cared about, and he kept them all up on a very high shelf in his Mind Palace where they were safe but often left dusty. Ultimately, he knew he would always be this way, and it just wasn't worth the tension. He put his phone back in to his pocket.

John creased his forehead, an incredulous grin on his face. 

"What?" He asked, obviously not quite ready to let the incident pass without further comment.  
  
Sherlock pointed at the chair where the girl had been seated moments before.  
  
"Emma Clarke's father.  The CEO of Magpie Publishing, it was how his appallingly untalented wife managed to get a book deal... Her murder was--."  
  
"Murder?" John interrupted, raising his voice again. "You haven't got any proof of murder, have you? And now you've scared an eleven-year-old child to--"  
  
"3 other murders within a month. I didn't think they were connected until just now." Sherlock said, unbuttoning his jacket button and sitting in front of John's laptop on the table, tapping quickly on the keys. "Thomas is one of my rats, one of the people I keep an eye on. Their movements keep me informed... I recognized the name as soon as Emma spoke it."

John nodded ironically, because he obviously did not agree with where Sherlock was going with this. 

"Right," He said, licking his bottom lip. "So you think he murdered his wife."   
  
Sherlock smiled darkly and looked up at John, then turned the laptop to face him. He'd pulled up a breaking news article, and the headline read:

**Woman Found Dead at Charing Cross**

"A name hasn't been released yet," Sherlock started. Standing, he went to the window and pulled back the drapes to look out on to the street. As he expected, the old woman was on her mobile, looking rather shocked over something. His mouth quirked to one side at the sight, but it wasn't a smile. "But the family is likely being notified as we speak." He looked back at John, who didn't appear particularly impressed, though concern did show through - probably for the aforementioned family of whomever it was who was just found dead.

John just couldn't stop himself caring... his cross to bear. 

"For God's sake," Sherlock said exasperatedly as he sat back down to the computer and turned it back to face himself. "It's a message."  
  
"A message? To who?"  
  
"4 murders inside of a month, all people connected to but not involved with big business crime. Thomas Clarke has long been suspected of skimming off the top of his own company... not to mention disseminating awful literature amongst a not wholly undeserving public." He said the last part partially under his breath, and then looked up at the doctor. "It's not a message to him. It's a message to _all_ of them."  
  
"What?" John asked.  
  
"The criminals of this city having been acting strange. Closing accounts here, taking unplanned trips there. Something happened to scare them, and now this. Someone's telling them something, but what, and why? What's going to _happen_?"  
  
He knew there was something bigger, too big to see unless held under the right light... But there was something else, too, that was tugging at him. He had information somewhere in his mind that pertained to this case, he could feel it... but he couldn't quite _place_ it.

"But why kill the wife? Why kill the people connected, but not the people responsible?" John asked, still looking unconvinced, which irked Sherlock because he didn't feel that he had ever given the man precedent to doubt him. He had never given _anyone_ precedent to doubt him, and yet they still tried to poke holes in his methods or conclusions. 

Even The Woman had done it, once.   
  
Sherlock allowed himself to think of her just for a moment. The case could wait just for the brief second that his mind decided to bring her down from her dusty shelf. He could smell her and _feel_ her, and the memories ached in a way that he was now familiar with, and he - suddenly and briefly - missed her. When he began to wonder if she ever felt the same about him, he knew he'd had her down for too long.

"Sentiment." Sherlock responded absently.

"Sentiment?"  
  
The detective looked at his friend and then sighed impatiently, though he was thankful for the distraction.  
  
"Yes, sentiment. Why did you offer to hold Moriarty and let me run that night by the pool? Self-sacrifice is easy, but sacrificing someone you care for is hard. It's the same concept here. The murderer is using sentiment against his victims. He doesn't want to get rid of the people involved, he wants to hurt them, likely to keep them in check." He paused, before continuing in a quieter tone. "Dying is easier than watching someone you love die because of you."

Then it clicked.

Sherlock's eyes slid shut as he ran through the available data. Criminals were having loved ones killed off, and it _was_ a message. Thomas Clarke's wife probably hadn't been innocent in whatever schemes her husband had been entrenched in, but she wasn't the important one of the two. Searching back through the information he had on the other murders, he felt this was obviously or at least likely to be the case with all of them. The murderer was paring down and reasserting some kind of dominance. Cutting away loose ends, but not burning bridges, and in the cruelest way possible.

Of course. Sherlock had been waiting for this.  
  
"Obvious." He whispered angrily, then opened his eyes. "The Woman."  
  
"The Wo-- what, you mean Irene Adler?" John asked with a bemused laugh. "You think Irene Adler is the murderer?"  
  
"No." Sherlock responded with a shake of his head and roll of his eyes, though hearing the name wasn't all together pleasant for him. "The information she had on that phone - Mycroft and the British government have that information now, and someone knows it."

Realization poured over John's face.

"Someone." He repeated, though it was clear he knew exactly whom Sherlock was alluding to.

Because, of course, it was Jim Moriarty... And if Jim Moriarty was cutting loose ends, The Woman was in danger.

Suddenly, Sherlock - his heart in his throat - began frantically looking around the flat.

"Sherlock, what are you--"

"Have we gotten a letter, or a-- a postcard recently?" He continued to pace the room, checking under stacks of newspaper, and piles of seemingly useless rubbish. He had no idea what it would look like, no idea if it was even here, no idea, even, if he was either dreading or hoping to find it.   
  
"You mean like the ones you just threw back down on the table?"  
  
"No..." Sherlock shook his head, and rumpled his hair with his hands in frustration. "It'll have been odd. You wouldn't have understood it."  
  
He half expected his companion to be offended by that, people sometimes were when he told them they wouldn't understand something - but this time it didn't seem to be the case.  
  
"Hang on..." John said, and Sherlock stopped mid step on to the coffee table, on his way to search the sofa cushions. "There is something."

Taking his foot down from the table, the taller man watched as his friend crossed to the mantle, picking up the birthday card that had been innocuously sitting there for two weeks. The two men met each other halfway, and John handed the card over. It was heavy white card stock, the words "Happy Birthday" were printed across it in shiny red letters. Other than that it was completely blank.

The red words triggered an emotional response that Sherlock didn't understand, and also didn't care to... But if this is what he thought it could be, then that was done with intent.

"The envelope didn't have a name."   
  
"Why did you keep it?"

"It wasn't mine. Some of us aren't in the habit of throwing away birthday cards that were meant for other people."

"Yes, but you didn't show it to me either."  
  
"Yes I did."  
  
"No you didn't--" Sherlock looked at his friend. "Did you?"  
  
"Ye--" John pointed at the card impatiently. "Is this what you were looking for?"

Sherlock turned the card over in his hands a couple of times and then brought it to his nose and sniffed at it.

"I don't know." He said before taking off abruptly in the direction of his room, John following as far as the kitchen archway. Sherlock emerged again a few moments later, shrugging his coat on. "But I suspect it isn't really blank. I'm going to need something that emits UV light."  
  
"Sherlock--"  
  
"Phone Lestrade. Find out whatever you can about the dead woman at Charing Cross."  
  
The detective made his way to the top step, his friend in tow.  
  
"Sherlock." John said again. He looked up and gave an impatient raise of his forehead. John pressed his mouth in to a line and put his hands in his pockets. "I have something that emits UV light."  
  
Sherlock's eyebrows came together.

**_..._ **

The dark haired man blinked once, then twice, staring at the gadget the doctor had just handed him. He'd seen this thing a few times, but never in his hand, or even in his flat. He associated it with London, though he wasn't quite certain why at first. It was something very unimportant, something repeatedly remembered, and then repeatedly deleted again. Something he'd seen in London. Something he'd seen... in a box? A man with a bowtie? His father? No, that couldn't be it. Some other man in a bowtie with a box. A blue box. A police phone-- 

 _Oh, for God's_ \-- 

"John, is this--"  
  
"Yes." The shorter man interrupted him sharply.  
  
"Why?"  
  
"It was a gift from a patient." Sherlock continued to stare absently at his friend, who was becoming increasingly visibly agitated under the inspection. "Look, if you press that little button, it..."  
  
John demonstrated, and a buzzing, blinking blue light activated at the tip of the cylindrical device, "Doctor Who?" embossed along the side.  
  
Sherlock blinked again.  John cleared his throat.  
  
"He thought it was funny, because..." He looked down, and exhaled a bit. "I'm a doctor."  
  
"Riotous." Sherlock replied monotonously. "And what exactly is the point of it?"  
  
"It's a pen, too."

 A beat.

"Listen... the blue light bit is UV."

Sherlock couldn't resist a last sidelong look at John before he sauntered off to his bedroom door, closing it to shadow the corridor in semi-darkness. He pulled the card from his pocket, and opened it. John came to stand several footsteps away, watching intently.

The coat clad man pressed the button on John's toy sonic screwdriver, which lit up again with a strange and irritating whir, and hovered it over the blank card.  
  
No, not blank.  
  
Sherlock let the button go, and the hallway fell silent again. Looking up at the doctor, his eyes only saw through him, his hands stiffening slightly around the paper - crumpling it just a bit. If the letter hadn't been here, he wouldn't have known anything about her safety at all. He would have had to guess at whether or not she was okay, or whether or not she was scared… but this left no room for guessing, no room for wondering. His heart threatened to stop as his eyes began to burn.  
  
"Does it say something?" John asked.

He didn't answer.

"Sherlock," his friend started, becoming impatient. "Does it--"  
  
"Find me." Sherlock interrupted in a low, painful, grumble.

Both men looked suddenly toward the staircase, as a crashing noise emitted from the lower floor. Sherlock took an exasperated breath and rolled his eyes as he walked to the top of the steps to meet Emma Clarke's livid grandfather rushing up to him as quickly as could be expected from a man his age. Sherlock clasped his hands behind his back.

"Bad ne--"

What Sherlock was about to say was, "bad news?" Which was, of course, unnecessary, seeing as he already knew the news the man and his wife had just received. There wasn't much to deduce here, but Sherlock assumed that there was some misplaced anger - but since he had recently been so artfully rude to the man's granddaughter, that anger was able to find a target.

Not that any of it mattered.

Sherlock found himself, not for the first time in his life, tackled to the ground just inside the sitting room of his flat - John Watson racing over to pull the old man off him.  
  
"Oi!" He yelled, his hands about to reach out for the old man's arms when he, who by now had Sherlock by the collar of his coat, looked at John.  
  
"My daughter's dead." He articulated simply, but the anguish was unmistakable. It made Sherlock inherently uncomfortable, and it would have even if all that anguish were not currently finding an outlet on his person.

John stared agape, that peculiar mix of incredulity and awe that was very singular to him upon his face, before relaxing his stance and clearing his throat.

"Right then." He said, giving what appeared to Sherlock as a relenting nod. The old man looked back at his captive who, for his part, stared with shock at his friend.

Sherlock cocked his head.  
  
"John?" He asked.

Then the old man punched the detective in the face - hard enough to knock him unconscious, as it turned out... Which was also not a first for Sherlock Holmes.

 

* * *

 

  **One Month Earlier...**

A tune lilted in and around Sherlock's mind. It wasn't unusual; music always helped him to think... His thoughts were somewhere else, however, and he didn't even concern himself with where the music was coming from. He let the notes, short and stilted, come to him one by one, each with their own whisper - a new idea upon every fresh yet familiar sound. 

_I took your pulse._

The thought whirled slowly and circuitously through his head, constantly being replaced with some other thought; only to come back round again the way that cream did when it was poured in a cup of tea. It would drop heavily underneath the dark surface and disappear for a moment before reemerging and swaying side to side and then slowly clouding the liquid completely... Just as this thought was slowly clouding his Mind Palace. The corridors were going dark; the doors to different rooms were closing, and Sherlock found that his footsteps echoed resonantly against walls that seemed to be newly bare. _  
_

There was nothing in here to focus on. Nowhere in here to hide.

_I took your pulse._

Sherlock's eyes snapped open as The Woman, clinging tightly to his upper arms, whimpered slightly against his mouth. In a moment of blind confusion he thought that he could feel her heart thudding madly against his chest before coming to the alarming realization that it was his own heart beating itself raw. The tactile data strumming its way through his already addled brain was almost too much to parse through. Her lips, her hands, the wetness of her tears on his cheeks, that _sound_ that she had just made. It wasn't possible that he should be experiencing any of this, least of all with The Woman, and least of all _tonight_ , but it _was_ happening.

His eyes slipping shut again, his right hand slid from her cheek and up through her hair to hold her head at the base of her neck, pulling her deeper in to this kiss that was supposed to be impossible, and a loud warning siren began to go off from somewhere inside his burning consciousness. As Irene's hands released their grip of his biceps, her arms began to encircle him in an embrace that suddenly - very suddenly - Sherlock did not want.

 _No, no, no--_  
  
Sherlock pulled away from the Woman, pulled away from her warmth and her promise, and stood up so abruptly that he had to turn around and lean on his forearm against the wall lest he fall victim to a very embarrassing bout of syncope. His breathing was approaching ragged, his lips were tingling, and he blinked and widened his eyes in turn to try and break the haze that threated to engulf him completely. After a few more harrowing moments of that, he was able at least to stand on his own.

He turned back to look at the wide-eyed woman on his bed, whose face was flushed and whose hand was up near her mouth as though she didn't believe he had been there just a short time before.

"I..." Sherlock started, and the rest of the sentence failed to materialize.

The room was silent, and Sherlock was morbidly reminded of the morgue, and then, by association, of Molly Hooper. Particularly of Molly, and then particularly of the horrible look on her face when he'd picked her apart at the Christmas party 6 months earlier. Then, of course, the image of Irene watching as Sherlock broke the code to her phone, ripping everything away from her grasping hands in one fell swoop, rose to the forefront of his concentration.

Sentiment. _Sentiment_. He didn't mean to hurt Molly, but it happened anyway, and why? Because she _let_ him. She let him in to her heart, but what's worse is that she let him _see_ in to her heart, and then he couldn't help but hurt her. It wasn't on purpose, it was never on purpose, but it also appeared to be decidedly unavoidable... And now Irene was making the same mistake, had already made the same mistake.   
  
She had looked away, had left herself unguarded, and her own boomerang had come back to slam her in the side of her head. She probably, even now, didn't know or understand what had hit her.  
  
But he did. He understood completely, and he wasn't, he _wasn't_ , going to make the same mistake as these two women who had given up their hearts so carelessly. He didn't even believe himself capable of it.  
  
Sherlock refocused his eyes on The Woman as his gaze had been waning, and found that she had dropped her hand back down to her side, but her shoulders rose and fell in deep, heavy breaths. She stared up at him with an intensity that he didn't feel altogether comfortable under.  
  
The detective let out a deep sound of frustration, throwing his hands up in anger.  
  
"This is absurd!" He vociferated, his left hand almost immediately combing through his hair.

"Why did you do that?" The woman asked in a deceptively calm tone, though her eyes were oddly sharp as the words left her mouth.

 Why did he do it? There was probably a very good reason for it, a better reason than that he was a man and that even he, occasionally, was evidently given over to incongruous loss of self-possession... But again, even _that_ was absurd, and when it came down to it, he couldn't think of an answer. All he could do was gesture lamely at his door and say:

"Leave."

"You kissed me." Irene responded, ignoring his demand.

Sherlock scoffed a bit.

"I hadn't noticed. Now _leave_."

The Woman was silent, and Sherlock couldn't ignore the constricting of his heart as he watched the varying levels of hurt and confusion register over her face.

No, wait, he could ignore it. He _would_ ignore it. Because whatever was happening now and in this room, it wasn't who he was, and furthermore it wasn't who he wanted to be. None of this made sense to him, not his own actions or his own betraying feelings of wretchedness. He was wholly unprepared, and manifestly ill equipped, and even putting aside the fact that that alone was heretofore uncharted territory for him, he also just _didn't_ like Irene Adler.   
  
She was far too much like him to be likeable.

"Why did you try to hide the photo of you and your brother?"

Sherlock angled his head to one side in confusion.  
  
"I-- what?"  
  
"The photograph of you and Mycroft as children." She gestured her head a bit toward the dresser, but didn't turn completely to look at it. "I noticed you turn it over. Why?"  
  
Sherlock averted his gaze to the portrait of Poe hanging on his wall above where the photo in question usually stood perched, pressing his lips together. Of course she had seen it.  
  
"I don't know." He answered truthfully, both because it was the easiest thing to do, and because he was now becoming very weary of this night and its dissonant events.

"Why do you keep it?"

For a moment, the question seemed so odd to him that it took priority over every other emotion and thought Sherlock was experiencing, and he met Irene's eyes with his own.  
  
"I don't understand." He responded before he could stop himself.  
  
The Woman was silent for a beat as she seemed to search Sherlock's eyes for something, and the man's heart quickened under the scrutiny of it. Others had looked over him this way before, scouring for a reason to believe him, a reason to doubt him, a reason to suspect that he was actually human... but he had never cared whether they found what they were looking for or not. Now, as Irene's eyes raked over his expression, he wasn't certain if the pain he felt that radiated from the middle of his chest out to the tip of his fingers was due to the thought that she would find what she was searching for, or that she wouldn't.

"You clearly don't like your brother." The Woman began, and her voice was markedly more professional now than it had been all night since her fall. She seemed much more like the Ms. Adler he had met back in her home in Belgravia. "Is it admiration or caution that's earned him a place along side Mr. Poe and the elements?" She finished, her eyes traveling to the periodic chart that hung next to his door.

Sherlock blinked, and by the time the blink was over, his face had smoothed in to an impassive mask.

"Caution?" He asked, raising his head a bit, and his demeanor was now business like as well.

"Not even Doctor Watson has merited the honor." She went on, ignoring his inquiry.

Sherlock furrowed his brow.  
  
"Why would I keep a picture of John in my bedroom?"

The woman looked at him sharply.

"Why do you keep a picture of your brother?"

When Sherlock said nothing, The Woman pushed herself up from the bed and walked around it, passed the man whom she was very thoroughly confusing, and went to stand in front of his drawers.

"I have-- well, _had_ , a photograph of my mother on a shelf in my dressing room." She said as she righted the frame and looked over its contents. "We were never close, her and I..." She looked at Sherlock, and while she gave the appearance that she believed what she spoke about was something no more important than the rain outside, he knew better. "I hated her, in fact."

Sherlock swallowed.

"Fascinating." He said blandly, though his voice cracked slightly. The Woman quirked down the sides of her mouth in a nonverbal shrug, before turning back to the photo.

"Isn't it?" She asked. "The things we do in the name of what you call sentiment. Keeping pictures of people we hate, changing the passwords to our phones to the names of people we--" She cut herself off there, and laughed a small, unhappy laugh. "Hate." She finished.  
  
Sherlock's heart seemed to contract at that, and The Woman looked at him again.  
  
"So, why do you keep this here?"

"Why did you keep the picture of your mother?" Sherlock countered, though he could guess. He was deflecting, because he understood now what she was getting at, and he wasn't in the mood to play anymore.

Why did he keep the picture of Mycroft and him? Irene had been correct on both counts. He admired his brother, though he would never admit it aloud. The older Holmes was clever and powerful, and Sherlock was satisfied that if he should have to have a sibling at all, that he should be someone like Mycroft. As for caution... the photograph was, in part, a reminder that there were a select few out in the world who could get the better of him if he wasn't careful, and his brother was one of them. Though the photograph was innocuous enough, the two of them standing straight with stoic expressions, their arms at their sides, it remained a note to keep his enemies close.

"Because I loved her." Irene responded simply as though she weren't contradicting her previous statement.

An odd thing occurred just then, which was Sherlock realizing he had been slowly closing the distance between he and The Woman, and that he was now standing beside her. 

He turned the photo back over, and then turned to Irene, who kept her eyes on where the frame had been standing straight a moment before.  
  
"That's unfortunate." He said, and he wasn't sure to what part of this whole affair he was referring.  
  
"That I loved my mother," she started, then turned to look up at the man who had destroyed her life. "Or just that I've ever loved anyone at all?"  
  
A beat, and then in a low voice Sherlock responded, once again with:  
  
"Leave."  
  
The Woman's placid mask faded, and her eyes were full of grief once again.  
  
"Do you really want me dead?" It was a question, but it sounded more like a plea to his ears.  
  
There were quite a few things Sherlock wanted in that moment. He wanted to be anywhere other than here, for a start. He wanted to be out on the streets of London chasing a cabbie through streetlights and odd turns. He wanted to be on a rooftop looking for signs that weren't visible at ground level. He wanted to be eating dinner at a chip shop with John - he wanted to be doing anything other than what he was doing, because what he _really_ wanted to be doing was something that he couldn't quite grasp with the experiences and vocabulary available to him... he only knew that he didn't want Irene dead. He didn't want her hurt. He didn't want her to leave.  
  
"No." He let out from behind painfully grit teeth before wrapping his arm around her waist and crushing her against his body, dropping his face to meet hers and meeting her mouth with his own.  
  
She pulled away.  
  
"What are you--"  
  
He caught her mouth again, and she stiffened for a moment in shock, or reservation, or whatever it was, but it didn't matter, because it was _only_ for a moment, and then she was sliding her tongue against his - forcing emotions and sensations upon him that he had never known existed. He found that he was pressing her against the wooden dresser behind her, needing something to push her closer in to his body. He'd never wanted to be this close to another human, physically or otherwise, and now there was nothing he wanted more.

Quickly, conflicting thoughts and desires battled their way through his already war torn mind. He did want this, but he didn't want to want it, which meant, at least in part, that he didn't want it. 

He could dissect this. He just needed a moment. He needed to collect himself.

Irene's hands were in his hair, and his hands were cradling her face - his thumbs against her chin, and his fingers splayed across her cheeks.  Oh, God, he didn't know what this was. He didn't know what any of this was.

Why did he want this? He'd have to admit that he liked the feel of it to continue any sort of analysis. Fine, done. He liked the feel of it. It wasn't abnormal, he reasoned. It wasn't even abnormal for him. While drugs had never been something he exactly did for the euphoric effects, he'd be lying to himself if he tried to act as though he didn't enjoy them. He wasn't above that sort of thing, and so now he wasn't above this sort of thing.

She groaned in to his hair something that may have been his name, but was more incoherent syllables, as he pressed kisses along her throat. What was he trying to do? Was he still trying to think? How could he think when The Woman was so perfectly and brilliantly _here_ and his?

He found her mouth again, swallowing her shuddering whimper as he did so. Okay, he'd think about why he _did_ want this later. There was more to why he wanted it than didn't want it, he guessed, so deconstructing it from the ground up was clearly the more viable option.

He _didn't_ want this, because he'd never wanted this. Though, even with that thought still coursing its way round his head, he pressed himself hard against The Woman, his hands bracing themselves against the wooden drawers behind her.   
  
Wait, where was he? Yes. He'd never wanted this, and continuing to not want this was more in line with his own characterization of himself. But that couldn't be the whole of it, could it? There was a hollow pain in the center of his chest when he attempted to prod further, and he knew that there was a much more pressing reason.

Irene pulled her mouth away from Sherlock's, her forehead resting against his, and her gaze burning in to his light blue eyes.

"Why do you keep that picture in here?" She asked breathlessly, and there was something devious in the question, but he couldn't force himself to care for the moment. He smiled, though it was a smile that didn't reach passed his mouth.  
  
"Why did you make my name your passcode?" He asked almost mockingly, even now able to feel a small amount of anger from the night's earlier activities flare up inside of him.  
  
The two of them stared at each other dangerously for a few infinite moments, both pairs of shoulders rising and falling with their harsh intakes of breath, before Irene broke eye contact and pushed through Sherlock's embrace to stand a bit away from him. He held the now free hand up for a moment as she walked away, before replacing it back against his dresser continuing to brace his weight against it, staring forward for a second longer, before turning his head to place his half lidded eyes back on her.

"I'm not a school girl with a crush." Irene said, squaring her shoulders. 

Sherlock let go of the dresser, and leaned back up against his wall, his head tilted up, but his eyes still focused on her.   
  
"No," he agreed, and felt that there was more to add, but had nothing more to say.  
  
"What is it that you want from me, Mr. Holmes?"  
  
He didn't know. His usual methods were completely failing him in this instance, and he felt lost - more lost than he could define or account for. There was nothing in his past to help him understand what he was dealing with, nothing within his grasp to aid him in working through the murky territory he now found himself irrevocably afloat in. He didn't know how it was possible to want two things absolutely that could not exist one with the other.

He hated her for this. 

"I want you out of my head." He answered bitingly with the only thing he was certain of at the moment.

The Woman smirked as though she thought his response foolish.

"And what about your heart?"  
  
Sherlock's lips pulled up in to a contemptuous smile.  
  
"Don't be a child." He said cruelly. "I don't make the mistake of thinking with my heart."  
  
She stepped toward him, and he didn't trust it. He didn't trust her, and he didn't trust himself with her. He realized, with not a little terror, that he was shaking.  
  
"Then why do you keep that picture in your room?"

Sherlock stood away from the wall and met The Woman's hard stare with his own, imposing his height over hers, though he said nothing. Finally, Irene broke eye contact with an impatient noise of disappointment before abruptly beginning to cross the floor to the door.

This was it, he knew. Whatever she had been searching for in his face and actions had not been there, and he'd disappointed her, _hurt_ her, and now she was leaving. He'd broken her down, and had broken her heart, had humiliated her and ruined her chances at whatever life she'd hoped to have, and still she'd shown up here to... to what? To give him a chance to... _what_? It didn't matter, because she was on her way out of his bedroom and out of his life, and he'd never see her again. If he let her walk out of 221B now, she was lost to him forever.

She was probably lost to him forever anyway.

No. He couldn't bear it anymore than he could have borne losing John that night at the pool, or losing his brother's faith tonight in the study. He cared for very few people in this world, and it was hard earned for each of them... It was shown to John in the way of respect, it was shown to Mycroft in the way of a simple photograph in a simple frame, and he would show it to Irene right now and tonight in the only way he would ever have the chance to.  
  
Before he knew what he was doing, he had her by the wrist, and had pulled her back against him. Her eyes were wide and alert.  
  
"You can't do this, and take it back." She said, warningly.

And as his mouth descended on hers for the third time in the same night, his heart feeling as though it would burst from the strain, he knew that she was right.

**...**

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I didn't make up the photograph of Mycroft and Sherlock. Mark Gatiss has said that it's somewhere in Sherlock's room, though no one has really ever seen it. There are some blurry pictures out there that suggest the photo sits atop Sherlock's dresser in the corner of the room, so I took that idea and ran with it. I love the idea of him having a photo of him and his brother in his room, and the thought process behind keeping it there.
> 
> Anyway, fair warning: The next chapter will be written specifically for a mature audience!


	3. Entry Point

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is intended for a mature audience!

**Chapter 3: Entry Point**

**...**   


Something inside of him hurt.  
  
There was a feeling that Sherlock rarely had occasion to feel, but one that he still felt often enough to where he was, at the very least, familiar with it. It was nearly the same sensation that came over him any time it became apparent during a game of chess, sometimes only two moves in, that he was going to lose. _Two_ moves in, and the strategy could _already_ be irreparably flawed, and he'd know it. It was the same for when he managed to fall a step behind a criminal, or when a missing piece of a puzzle was failing to fall in to place. It was frustration and disappointment, but it was also more than that. It was something more emotional than cerebral, and therefore just beyond his understanding.

It was how he felt now as he pressed The Woman against his bedroom wall, his lips against hers, pinning her hands to the wall by her wrists at either side of her head.

He'd lost something tonight, or was in the middle of losing something currently. If he were another man, and Irene another woman, perhaps all of this would have felt much different. There would have been promise; the hope of something more... but now there was only a vague sense that this, whatever this was, was only going to make things, whatever things _were_ , worse.

Sherlock released Irene's left hand so that he could bury the fingers of his right in to her hair. She pulled away from his mouth, breathing hoarsely.

"Sherlock, I--"  
  
He caught her mouth with eager lips before she could finish her sentence. He didn't want to hear what she was going to say. Hearing his name spoken in her gasping tone was almost too much as it was. It hurt. All of this hurt, and he couldn't understand why.

Using her newly freed hand, The Woman began quickly pinching the buttons of Sherlock's shirt unclasped, and he could feel his heart begin to pound harder at several different points of his body - some that he was used to, and some that he very decidedly was not. Intellectually he knew that this was all headed somewhere that he had never been before, but the synapses weren't connecting, and he couldn't follow his own thoughts to conclusion. 

He tried to think about this situation logically: He was certainly kissing Irene Adler, and he must have been enjoying it otherwise he would have stopped... There still remained, of course, the odd pain that he was feeling, which did not seem to be coming from anywhere in particular, or seem to be _caused_ by anything in particular. Assuredly, it was due, in part, to kissing Irene... Though, since he still didn't stop, it must have been worth it to keep going.

Sherlock released Irene's other hand, and immediately it went to join the other in unbuttoning his shirt until it lay completely open at his waist along with his suit jacket. Her hands ran up the length of his back underneath the fabric and then around down the sides of his abdomen, the muscle there unconsciously contracting under her touch. A moment later, she was untucking the shirt and pushing it and his jacket off of his body, and Sherlock absentmindedly helped her with a few quick shrugs of his shoulders.

The cold air hit him instantly, and though he had never much liked the cold, he invited it now. It was grounding to feel something so recognizable when everything else had become clouded by uncertainty.

He gripped The Woman by her hip and pulled her away from the wall, his other hand going to the zipper at the back of her dress - another first for him in a night riddled with new experiences. As he pulled the metal slowly down the zip at her back, The Woman moaned in to Sherlock's mouth and he found himself pulling away from the kiss to stare in to her storming blue eyes. It was suddenly necessary to see the expression on her face, to see if it mirrored his own... but it didn't. Her eyes were wide, and her pupils were dilated so that there was nearly no blue visible, but she didn't look worried or stricken with reservation.

"It's okay..." She whispered, running her hand through his hair, and then down to caress his cheek.

But it wasn't okay. 

It wasn't okay as he turned The Woman slightly and pushed her backward on to the bed. It wasn't okay as he pulled the tacky black fabric of her dress down her shoulders, his heart thudding agonizingly, and it wasn't okay as she lifted her hips so that he could pull her dress the rest of the way down her body.  
  
This wasn't okay. She loved him and in turn he'd ruined her, and now... now she was ruining him.  
  
Sherlock took in deep breaths as he raked his eyes over the semi nude form of Irene Adler. She swallowed as his eyes made their way over her lace-concealed breasts and down her torso, and over her abdomen for a moment before locking his eyes with hers. He'd seen her completely naked already, but this was so different and so removed from that experience. She had been someone else then, had been wearing a different face... but this was just The Woman. _The_ Woman.  
  
"Disguise is always a self portrait." He said quietly almost without meaning to. He caught the look of confusion that flickered over The Woman's face briefly before he leaned back in to reclaim the kiss he realized he'd been missing ever since he released her lips from his own.

He rode the surge of adrenaline with a groan, pressing Irene's body into his bed. It occurred to him that if this wasn't okay the way he kept telling himself it wasn't, that he could simply stop... but it was the thought of stopping that triggered the worst of the pain, and he realized that it wasn't what he was doing with Irene now that was causing him distress... It was what he had already done.

He had done deep damage to The Woman that now appeared to be his whole world as he pressed his bare torso against her black lace, and there would never be any way to make amends.

He could kiss her until her lips were raw, hold her until he trembled from the effort, he could even let her stay with him here tonight, tomorrow, or for a year... But what he'd done to her was permanent, and the hurt he'd caused her was likely to become a part of her and her personal mythology. He'd changed her life and therefor her... and there was something horribly tragic about that, because he missed her even as her skin burned in to his. He knew that he could never let her leave after this, but that he would _have_ to.

He'd already done one impossible thing tonight, and there wasn't room in his life for another. 

Irene was pushing Sherlock up and away from her so that all his weight was braced on the palms of his hands, and for a moment he felt panic at the loss of contact, which in turn sent him in to a deeper panic at the idea that he could be so effected by her... and then he realized what was happening. Her hands went to the button of his trousers, and he looked down in to her eyes that were openly questioning. She wasn't moving, but her fingers were poised and ready. Did she want his permission?

"I don't..." His sentence trailed off before he could tell her what "he didn't" as she unclasped the button at her fingertips, which was just as well, because he didn't really have a clue as to what he was going to say. He was at a loss, and he was in a state of alarm that he didn't believe he'd ever felt... And while it was something close to frightening, it was also something close to incredible.

It wasn't love. He couldn't possibly be in love...

But his mind, ever sensible and ever logical rejoined with a voice that sounded suspiciously and irritatingly like his brother...

_How would you know?_

Dear God, this couldn't be love...  
  
"Don't look so frightened." The Woman said, and Sherlock focused his eyes back on her flushed face, noting the teasing smirk upon her lips. "I don't bite."  
  
Sherlock tilted his head.  
  
"No?" He asked, and wasn't pleased to find that his voice was low and breathy.

He could stop. He could stop right now, and end this. He didn't have to submit to his feelings this way... but then The Woman's teasing grin spread in to a real smile that lit her features up brighter than if he had held a candle to her face...

And Sherlock knew he was damned. 

"Not unless you ask." She responded, slowly unzipping Sherlock's trousers. He shivered then either at the cold or what her words promised, but he didn't care which. It didn't matter.

He wanted her. He knew he wanted her, and his actions up to this point had admitted it before his thoughts did now. There was nothing left to hold on to save her, and nothing left to do but give in entirely, and the moment he relented he felt a brief measure of peace before being utterly overwhelmed by what must have been arousal (what, indeed, it must have been this whole time), and it was more than intoxicating.

He could understand, finally, why so many people had lost themselves to lust and sentiment.

 _And love?_ The voice mocked, but Sherlock adamantly ignored it.

Sherlock leaned down to The Woman, nuzzling a line from the hollow of her throat up to her ear where he stopped and whispered:

"I'm _asking_."

She let out an exhale at that, as though she'd been holding her breath... and perhaps she had been. 

Irene pushed herself up, wrapped her leg around the detective and, without much trouble, expertly rolled the two of them over so that she was straddling his thighs, but not sitting on them. Sherlock watched with wide eyes as she proceeded to pull his trousers down his legs, and watched himself as he lifted his own hips to help her along. It was as though his body was in control now, and Sherlock was thankful because it seemed to know what to do where his brain certainly did not. The Woman quickly rid him of his shoes, his socks, and then roughly pulled his trousers over his ankles, and discarded them over the back of the bed where they were immediately forgotten.

A moment later she was on top of him again, sitting on his lap with a seductive smile, her eyes half lidded.

"Now..." She said, her voice steady and direct, running her nails softly down his chest. "What are you asking for?"

Sherlock caught her hand by the wrist as it hovered over the waist band of his pants, and the vaguely playful expression on her face gave way to one of confusion.

"You." Sherlock responded to her, hoping that she would understand his meaning without need of an explanation. He didn't want what everyone else got. He didn't want a show, or a professional. He wanted _his_ Irene Adler.

Her eyes went back and fourth across his face, and then they seemed to soften.

She understood him. Of course she did.  
  
"You have me." She said, and the plain honesty written all over her was almost heartbreaking. Sherlock couldn't take being so far away from her any longer, and so he reached up to the back of her neck and pulled her back down to him. Their mouths came together in a way that Sherlock had not experienced yet tonight, or ever, and the heat and longing was unmistakable from both sides. Keeping one hand tangled in her hair as it fell over his face and shoulders, he slid his other palm up her back to the clasp of her bra. With a pinch of his thumb and index finger, the undergarment came undone, and he moved both hands to the straps to slowly move the material down her arms - brushing the backs of his fingers down her skin as he went. He could feel small bumps begin to rise at his touch, and deepening the sensuous kiss he and The Woman shared was all he could do to keep from swearing his unending devotion to her then and there.  
  
Frantically now, Irene was pulling at his pants, and Sherlock raised his hips once again to help her clumsily pull them down his body to a point where he could kick them the rest of the way off, while also helping her shed the last bit of lace that separated the two of them. As the black knickers slid down her calves, the blue eyed man took deep shuddering breaths, trying to compose himself - trying to make sense of what was happening; of what was about to happen.

"Sherlock," Irene gasped as she sat atop him, their bodies finally completely touching. "I want you..."

And he wanted her, too, terribly.

"You..." He swallowed, his breath catching just for a moment. "Have me."

The two of them were silent and still at that, staring in to each other's eyes. Maybe she was trying to read the full meaning of what he had just said, but it was pointless, because even he was unsure of it. He only knew that he meant it.  
  
He needed her now. Right now.  
  
The Woman must have sensed the urgency in his tenseness, or perhaps she could see it in his face... but just as he felt he couldn't bear not being with her a moment longer, she reached between their bodies and gripped him in her hand. Sherlock's breath became labored and unsteady as he watched Irene steady herself with her free hand on his chest, knowing that this moment was about to change everything for him.  
  
The Woman pitched her hips forward, a gasp escaping her mouth, and Sherlock's eyes slid shut of their own volition. 

_Dear God..._

A torrent of new sensations crashed upon the detective in unrelenting waves. The ache in his chest was nearing unbearable, though it was different now than it had been before... but he felt comforted at the same time. However, that emotion was quickly becoming less and less relevant against the physical sensation of being wrapped in warmth and...   
  
A moan ripped itself from Sherlock's throat as The Woman began moving over him in a rocking motion, back and fourth - each new stroke of her body eliciting feelings of intense pleasure and need. He couldn't understand how something could feel so... _good_. He'd experimented with quite a few recreational substances, had even had a brief stint with addiction, but nothing had ever come close to this. Nothing had ever touched upon this burning desire inside of him. He had never even known he was capable of this level of _feeling_ , either emotionally or physically. He opened his eyes, and pressed his lips together, his teeth digging in to the lower, at the sight before him.  
  
Irene's head was thrown back, her hair grazing against his thighs, one hand still pressed against his chest, the other bracing her weight on his knee, as she rolled her body forward at a mesmerizing pace. Sherlock gripped her hips with both hands, feeling her muscles work as she moved.

It was entirely impossible that this should be happening. It couldn't have been more than 2 and a half hours earlier that he was stripping her bear of all her defenses and pretenses, of every lie she had thought to tell him. He had wanted to show her what it felt like to be at the mercy of another's game, of another's intellect... and he had. He had completely destroyed her, and had never expected to see her again, so _how_? How was it that he was again finding himself under her expert control and completely at her mercy?

Then The Woman began to move in a pivoting motion that sent shivers down the detective's spine, and any thought as to "how" this had happened was completely banished from his mind.  
  
Never mind the how. It was happening, and that was all that mattered... And he couldn't deny, not even for a moment, that he felt something deeply for the woman on top of him, and he wanted to show her. For the first time in his life, he wanted to show another person that they meant something to him, and what's more... He wanted to use his body to do it.  
  
"Look at me." Sherlock said, and it came out more demanding than he had meant it to. The Woman lowered her head and opened her eyes, but continued to move against him, her body forcing his to contract and burn beautifully.  
  
"Yes, Mr. Holmes?" She asked, and the sound of her voice was a caress that he briefly closed his eyes against.  
  
He slid his hands up from her hips to her waist, relishing the feel of her smooth skin against his palms.  
  
"Tell me..." she moved roughly against him at that, and he grunted at the new wave of pleasure. She smiled almost lazily at him. "Tell me what you want."  
  
She tilted her head a bit, her motion slowing but not halting. She moved her hand slowly from his chest to rest on his left hand against her skin and entwined her fingers within his... Sherlock lay transfixed as slowly, very slowly, she skimmed his palm up along her torso, and then pushed it up against her breast. His other hand came up unconsciously to cup the other, and Irene leaned back on to both arms on either side of Sherlock's legs.

He gently caressed the soft flesh in both of his hands, feeling the skin become taut underneath his fingers. He was so engrossed in the wonderful weight and feel of them that he hardly noticed Irene whispering his name once and then twice- her back arched in to his touch.

God, she was heart achingly beautiful. He wanted her for his own. He needed her to be his... There was no alternative, no other way it could be. A mind like hers would be wasted on anyone else. _Irene Adler_ would be wasted on anyone else. She had to be in the company of someone who would appreciate every facet of her being - more than her body, more than her beauty, she was an anomaly in a world where a graduate degree was the accepted height of intelligence. It was no wonder she had to misbehave to find a place where she fit - of course this world didn't accept her. She was better than it, beyond it. She was like him.  
  
Sherlock suddenly wrapped his arms around her back, and pulled her down to rest against him - the softness of her chest touching the firmness of his for the first time. A muffled noise of pleasure left her lips and floated to his ears as he held her tightly to him. Her sweat slicked body continued to writhe mercilessly against his, and he knew that he was already close to completion... He had never understood what the uproar had been about when it came to sex or making love, or whatever term one chose to apply, but now he couldn't understand why he had deprived himself of it for so long.

Of course, he had not met The Woman until recently, and if he was being honest with himself, he could not imagine himself needing or wanting any other person this way.

Dammit, he had given in in every way except for falling in love. He wouldn't do that. Giving her his body seemed easy in retrospect. It was, after all, _only_ his body. His mind, however? He couldn't let anyone close to his mind, because that was who he really was. His body was merely a physical vessel for use in the aid of collecting data... His mind was what sorted through that data; his mind was what _actually_ lived. He wouldn't give that up. His mind _was_ his heart, and she couldn't have it...

Sherlock moved his hand up to caress the back of The Woman's head, moving his face so that his lips were near her ear, though he said nothing - _could_ say nothing. He merely panted and grunted, grimacing against the emotions and physical sensations that were quickly becoming too much to bear.

Irene's thighs tensed and tightened around him. She pulled away from his embrace and sat up, holding her weight with both palms pressed against his chest. He watched her, teeth firmly planted in his lower lip, his eyes alternating between being wide open and then clenched shut. Her eyes slid closed and remained closed, intensely provocative sounds escaping constantly from her open mouth. Sherlock's gaze remained fixed on her with a mix of fear and wonder. 

She was perfect. Absolutely perfect...  
  
And she was going to be the end of him.

Without thinking, Sherlock took hold of Irene, and rolled the two of them over so that he was now on top of her. Her eyes were wide with surprise, but a satisfied smile played on her lips for a moment - and only for a moment, before Sherlock continued on in the pace that she had set for him.

"Oh, God..." She murmured, throwing her head back on to the pillow, and Sherlock pressed his face in to her neck. He pressed an open mouth kiss on the skin he found there, before finding her lips with his and kissing her deeply and slowly. Her hands buried themselves in his hair, holding his mouth to hers, as one leg wrapped itself around his thigh.  
  
She pulled away, another moan escaping her. Sherlock pushed himself up on to one forearm, and felt his way down her body with his free hand, starting at the hollow of her neck, moving down her breasts, her flat stomach, and then to the point where their bodies met.

He watched her face closely as he pressed his fingers to her sensitive flesh, watched as her mouth fell open wordlessly, her eyes squeezed shut and her face contorting in to an expression that was almost reflective of pain, but one that he knew was quite the opposite. He continued to rock his body at a steady pace, his own eyes sliding closed at the pleasure.

"Irene." He whispered... and with that, he could feel her muscles tense and shudder around him, her leg pressing against his thigh.  
  
"Sherlock!" She gasped in a high-pitched tone he had not yet heard from her, as her hands gripped the bed sheets underneath her.

He kept his pace, dropping his face to the pillow beside The Woman's head - the fire that had been building inside of him setting loose on the whole of his being. Every inch of his body, starting from the inside out, from his heart to his fingertips, burst in to flames.

He loved her. Dear God, he _loved_ her.

He couldn't remember why he was hurting, or why she was here. He couldn't remember any of the whys or the hows, or the painful truths of their circumstance... He just knew, as his body burst against hers, that he needed her more than he had ever needed anything, more than _any_ man had ever needed anything. And he was losing her now, just as he was gaining her.   
  
And it was _his_ fault.

Why had he tried to deny it? Why had he denied to himself for so many years that he was capable of this kind of emotion? Could he have saved himself or Irene from the trouble? Or the pain?

The intensity of these thoughts began to subside almost as soon as it had emerged, though the thoughts themselves remained as Sherlock panted in to the pillow. The Woman's hand gently ran up and down his back, and he became suddenly aware that he was resting all of his weight on top of her. He pushed himself up, and then off of her, and laid himself on his back next to her on the bed. 

He swallowed as he stared up at the ceiling, his mind in a haze, his heart decidedly breaking. He couldn't bring himself to look at her.

"I..." He started, though his throat was dry. "I'm sorry." He went on. "Forgive me."

The Woman shifted on the bed next to him, positioning herself on her side so that she faced him.

"No." She responded.

 _No._ Sherlock thought. _Of course not._  


**...**

**TBC**

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What I was trying to get across here is Sherlock's crushing ambivalence. I didn't want this to be easy for him...
> 
> Thanks, as always, for reading! I appreciate it more than my meager supply of words will allow me to express. Now, onward to part 4!


	4. Exit Wounds

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> First off I would like to extend a sincere and extremely heartfelt thank you to the readers and the reviewers (the lovers, the dreamers) of this story. I know this particular pairing is not very popular when held up against other relationships in the fandom, but the response to "Come Attrition" from a wonderful and vocal minority has left me speechless at times. I feel like I'm not just writing a piece of fan fiction, but a real story with real people really invested in it. This is an incredible fandom, so thank you so much for opening your arms and minds to my words.
> 
> Second off, I mentioned before that I'm going to be jumping back and fourth a bit. However, to avoid confusion, the night in Sherlock's bedroom is always the touchstone. Every other point in time is always going to be somewhere on the timeline in relation to that night. :) 
> 
> Thanks again for all the awesome support! I hope you guys enjoy this installment!

**Chapter 4: Exit Wounds**

**...**

 

  **8 Months Later**

There were only two emails in his inbox, both over half a year old, and both long since committed to memory... Which didn't stop Sherlock Holmes from rereading them now.

The first, only four words long, had been of singular and needed consolation when he had initially received it:

_Let me come forward._

She wouldn't have done unless he asked her to, and she certainly would have if he did. It would have meant her discovery and likely her death, but she would have done it anyway. For him.

The second email was much longer, and one that he often read to himself even when there was no computer or mobile device available, when all he had was his mind for company and his memory of her for solace.

He was dead now. Well, at least for all intents and purposes. Sherlock Holmes had jumped off the roof of a building, and the man who now walked about the world with his face was little more than a ghost. A whisper. A rumor. He was alone, and necessarily so. It had been weeks since his last communication with his brother, and months since he'd last spoken to Molly. He was truly disappearing now, as was always the plan.

Now he sat in a dark corner of an Internet cafe looking over his nearly empty inbox, reading the only two emails that had ever been sent to this address. It had been set up with the sole purpose of being a point of contact between he and The Woman if (and only _if_ , seeing as how electronic mail was about as far away from secure as one could get) correspondence was absolutely urgent and time sensitive.

_Let me come forward._

That had been sent during the worst of it, when Richard Brook was wreaking havoc on his reputation and his life. When the vicious headlines were daily, and not a soul save John Watson was on his side. Of course, that was always what was supposed to happen. He and Mycroft had planned for this, had allowed for the probability that Jim Moriarty would try to destroy Sherlock's name given the fact that all he ever wanted when in custody was information on the younger Holmes. They had both known it would most likely come to defamation... The only thing they hadn't allowed for was how it would actually _feel_ once it came to pass. After all, why would they have? The detective had made it clear on numerous occasions that he was beyond caring.

... But he couldn’t have known how thorough and unrelenting it was going to be, and wading through the ruins of his reputation in those last days was agonizing.

Though he hadn't responded to her then, and though he would never have asked her to come forward to prove who Moriarty was, the email had been heartening. The Woman believed in him and would have risked her life to defend his name - had even risked being caught just by sending the email. This placed her securely in the very small and personally revered group of people that consisted previously of only John Watson and Molly Hooper. She had become so much more with those four words than she had even been before.

And what she had been _before_ was the only woman he had ever loved.

The second email had come after the fall that she had so prudently foreseen that night in his bedroom. After the papers and the television had publicly announced his suicide. Where the first was short and sweet, the second was lingering and painful. He had not thought of The Woman as he pushed his life as he knew it away with a phone call and a jump, but then he couldn’t have afforded to at the time. He knew what he was giving up, knew, indeed, that he could be gone for years... And all he could allow himself to think about was the matter at hand. Moriarty's network had to be destroyed. 

Then the message came one week later, when he was already well out of London... And it had made him utterly useless to himself and the world for all of an hour. Just an hour... He gave it to himself. He allowed it. He had earned it. An hour of heartsickness and longing. An hour where he would have done anything to see the face of John Watson, or to sip a cup of tea poured by Mrs. Hudson, or to see the look of impossible loyalty on Molly's face. An hour of wishing he were anybody else but Sherlock Holmes...

_I realise now that it was always too late for us... but I did hope. I don't know what I hoped for, but I liked to think that you did, too, in your own way. I like to think that you did love me, even if you most likely didn't. I like to think you're still here, even though you're not. I'd do anything to make you stay, but you've left already. I must say it was quite selfish of you, jumping off a building like that. All you had to do was ask, didn't you know? I would have... I don't know what I would have, but now we'll never know. Well. Isn't that just the way life goes? I suppose you'll never read this, will you? Then I'll tie it up, because I'm good at tying things up and letting things go, but I do have one request. Just one._

_Please. Please don't be dead. Let's have dinner._ _  
_

Now, Sherlock clicked the window closed and sat back in the uncomfortable plastic chair, knowing that he couldn't stay here much longer, but unable to stand up for the moment. That email, sent so many months ago, still had the singular ability to completely incapacitate him, and for quite a few reasons. Firstly, she had asked almost the exact thing that John had asked at his empty gravesite. 

 _Don't. Be. Dead._  
  
He had initially thought this to be an odd coincidence, but then it occurred to him that the people he inspired loyalty in had to have at least a few things in common... And not wanting him to be dead just happened to be one of them.

Another reason he was always stunned in to paralysis after looking through the email was the fact that she had admitted that she had hoped that he had actually loved her. Every time he looked over it, he wanted to contact her and tell her that he wasn't dead, and _of course_ he loved her. He wanted to repeat it over and over until he was blue from the lack of oxygen. He wanted their few stolen moments back so that he could beg her to stay just as she begged him to stay in her message... But he didn't. _He wouldn't._ He knew what he had given up in letting her leave him, and that he would never, _never_ , have it again. 

The first time he'd read this email, he had allowed himself an hour, and then had pushed it away from his thoughts and his heart... But this time, he swore to himself he would never read it again, because now, _especially_ now, when he was so alone and there was so much work to be done, and his hands shook from exhaustion and from the torment of longing for so many things that he could not hope to have...  
  
He wished he had never met her.

* * *

  **8 Months Earlier**

**...**

 Sherlock still couldn't bring himself to turn and look The Woman in the eyes, though he had a feeling that she was waiting for him to do so. His body was still tingling from her touch; every nerve ending was still humming from the sensation of release... But he felt empty now. He felt like he had lost everything that she had given him, everything she had offered him... and all before he had ever really had it. Whatever pain he had been feeling before was nothing compared to what he was feeling now.

"We..." He started, and then couldn't find the words to express to her that he felt that they "shouldn't" have done what they had just done... because every way the sentence ended in his mind it came out sounding cruel, and he didn't want to be cruel. He wanted to be direct and truthful, but not cruel. Not now.  
  
"Oh, you're trying to take it back." Irene said casually. "I told you that you couldn't do that."

Sherlock clenched his eyes shut as The Woman's hand came to rest on his forearm, both at the touch of his over sensitive skin, and at her words.

He couldn't think of anything to say. She was right in more ways than she knew. He couldn't take back what they had just done anymore than he could take back his frightful introspective admission of love. Putting that aside, however, he was beginning to feel something much worse than regret... He knew that he could never tell her how he felt, and that he was going to have to make her leave for her sake and for his own... And he was going to have to do it soon.

She was going to leave here hating him, and there was nothing he could do about it.

Sherlock sat up and threw his legs over the side of his bed, his feet making contact with the floor; Irene's touch still burning in to his forearm.

"That was..." He started, but again could not find the words.

"Go on..." She prodded. Sherlock took a deep breath.

"Ill-advised."

The heartbroken man flinched at his own words, but then resolved to steel himself against his emotions in the next moment. He had made a mistake; had let lust and emotion cloud his judgment.... But he wasn't going to continue on making bad decisions by being some sort of ridiculous lovelorn fool. There was no point in that, least of all because as hard as he might try to look, there was no place for The Woman at 221B Baker Street. There was no place for her in Britain. She had made certain of that.

 _He_ had made certain of that.

To Sherlock's surprise, Irene laughed at that. Out of sheer confusion, he finally turned to look at her, his eyebrows knit together in a frown. He was dismayed to find that the light had completely gone from her eyes. Whatever they had just held for him, they didn't now. She was already beginning to distance herself. He didn't want this.  
  
"I'm sorry." She said off of his look, holding her hand to her chest. "It's just that... I never thought I'd fall victim to this particular cliché."  
  
"What?" He asked flatly.  
  
"Oh, you know." She responded, stretching languidly on the bed. "Give a man what he wants, and then he'll discard you like a--"  
  
"That's _not_ what this was." Sherlock interrupted, hurt and offended, though he was trying his very best to be neither.  
  
"Oh?" She asked, her eyes widening in mock disbelief. "Then you're not currently trying to reason with yourself... This was just a one off, a mistake, you weren't _thinking_?"

Sherlock swallowed.

"No, I..."  
  
Nothing. No words would come.  
  
"'No, you' _what_ , Mr. Holmes?"

He willed himself to be as detached and cool as she was seemingly finding it so easy to be. Everything he was feeling, all the things he had just done and said... it felt so alien to him, and he couldn't recognize this person sitting here in his skin. He didn't understand him, and could not read or reason with him. He was a stranger, and one that he was beginning to hate more and more with each passing second.

Sherlock narrowed his eyes at The Woman.

She was shaking, only slightly, and fiddling nervously with the ring on her right hand. Her chest was rising and falling in odd intervals, as though she was consciously aware of it and trying to meter its cadence. She looked aloof, yes, but there was something all together too sharp in her eyes for her expression to pass completely for aloofness.

All this, of course, led to the conclusion that she was faking. She was good at that... but then again, he supposed, so was he.

"I think it's safe to say that now is a good time to put an end to our association," He answered her, hardening his face. "Don't you?"

He stood at that, not risking a look at her expression. Truth be told, he didn't think he could take it just then.

He walked around the bed to the foot and collected his pants and trousers, and began redressing casually, as though nothing had happened. He was forcing himself to focus on what he knew, what was real, what was absolutely tangible, and... What was that, exactly?

 _Focus._ He reprimanded himself.

"John will be in soon, so I imagine you'd like to be gone before then." He heard the words come out of his mouth as he, his pants already on, put one leg of his trousers on, and then the other. "I don't expect the conversation I'd have to have with him should he find you here would be mature or stimulating, so I'd rather save myself at least from that tonight." He went on, pulling his zip up and clasping his button, walking immediately toward his dresser where his shirt and jacket still lay discarded on the floor.

For her part, Irene remained completely silent, though Sherlock still refused to chance a look at her.

He picked up his shirt and pulled it on over his shoulders, ignoring the shaking in his hands as he began to work the buttons closed starting from the top... All the while hoping that she would move, or speak. Once his shirt was completely buttoned, he tucked it in and stared down at his jacket, contemplating whether or not he should put it back on... but knowing it didn't matter. He ran his hands down his mouth, and turned to look at the tipped over frame on his dresser, because he didn't know what else to do. He stared at it for a long few moments, remembering suddenly that Irene had been quite hell bent on getting a reason for its being here out of him.

"You want to know why I keep this in here," he began, righting the photo yet again. "Because you think it'll offer some insight in to my mind," He paused. "But you're wrong. I don't think or reason the way you do, so you can't hope to base your theories as to what I am or the motivations behind what I do on your own standard." He kept his eyes on the young faces of he and his brother for a moment longer before finally turning to look at Irene.

Sherlock's stomach sank at the unconcealed hurt that lay across her face, but he didn't have a choice in how to move forward. 

"It's not for love that my brother has earned a frame in my bedroom," He continued even though he could feel the bits of his heart cracking away with each word. "And it's not for love that you've managed to fill a space in my bed."

She winced, and Sherlock felt shame... Deep and unadulterated, it was something he'd never quite felt before, and he had to resist the urge to let out a sob then and there.

The Woman opened her mouth as though to speak, and then closed it again to swallow as tears brimmed her eyes. Sherlock forced himself to keep his eyes on her - forced himself to stay rigid and unreadable. He had some experience with repressing his emotions and even his desires, so he was able to maintain the veneer, but this was the first time he'd ever hated himself for it.

"In my profession, there are endless opportunities to feel debased or degraded." Irene started, and her voice was bordering on hoarse as she pulled her legs up to her chest in a way that looked positively defensive. "But I've always managed to be above it... Beyond it. I've never felt in contempt of myself... until now." A beat. "Until you."

"I..." Again he was speechless, and he wholly resented being so. "Forgive me." He repeated his plea from earlier, though he wasn't entirely sure which part of this he was asking her to forgive him for. Was it for the callous behavior after having so fully and willingly given himself to her? Was it because it burned him to the core to know that because of him she felt that she had disrespected herself in some way?

Or was he simply asking her to forgive him for guessing that she loved him?

"No." She caressed the word on her tongue as it came out of her mouth.

Sherlock put his hands exasperatedly over his hips, turning his head to look toward the bedroom window that over looked Mrs. Hudson's garden. How had he got here? How had things become so fantastically misshapen? He took a deep breath and closed his eyes.  
  
"What do you want from me?" He asked, and then looked back at Irene. She appeared almost as lost as he felt.

"I want you to admit that you love me."

For a moment, Sherlock seemed to have forgotten how to breathe as sirens went off, red flags went up, and walls began to quickly build themselves around him brick by brick. Love? She wanted him to admit-- what? No. Absolutely, utterly, emphatically, _no_. 

Sherlock hadn't noticed that he had been stepping backward until his back hit the wood of his dresser drawers. He stared open mouthed at The Woman as though she had just ripped his heart out through his mouth and was now asking him to swallow it again. It was one thing for him to come to the realization himself when he was in the throws of grief and ecstasy, but to say the actual words aloud? There was no way. He couldn't trust her with it. He couldn't trust himself in a world where he had told Irene Adler that he loved her... It was his last barrier. His last stronghold. He'd be lost - lost completely and forever if he told her. He wouldn't. Not now, not ever.  
  
"Admit it." She repeated, almost on a whisper... though it was oddly evident that she didn't actually believe that he _did_ love her, which made him feel even more wretched. He couldn't tell her, he just bloody _couldn't_ , but a part of him _did_ want her to know. He didn't want to hurt her.  
  
God, he _didn't want_ to hurt her.

Sherlock pressed his lips together, trying to collect himself.

"Admit what?" He spat, holding back his own damnable tears. "There's nothing to admit."

He was scared now. Really and truly scared, and he could feel the cold grip of panic begin to rise up and strangle him. His throat threatened to close up on him completely.

Irene stared at him, her eyes bright with pain and tears, her lips parted slightly in an expression of disbelief. 

"You really are a--"  
  
"Yes, I really am." He interrupted her curtly, not knowing exactly what she was going to accuse him of being, but knowing it was going to be unflattering... and also, most likely, true.

The Woman threw her legs over the side of the bed almost gracefully, opposite of where Sherlock stood. He kept his gaze rooted to the far wall, avoiding lingering on her nude form for any length of time. She went quickly to the floor at the foot of the bed. He could see her in his peripheral vision shuffling rapidly through fabric, putting her undergarments and dress back on. The sense of breathtaking loss he felt as she did so had absolutely nothing to do with the fact that she was no longer going to be naked in front of him.

"Well, Mr. Holmes." Irene started, her voice as crisp and cold as ice. He moved only his eyes to look at her as she began crossing to the door. "You've well and truly won." She paused, as she reached for the knob. "Thank you."

"What?" He asked tonelessly.

She looked at him, and Sherlock forgot how to make his heart beat.

"For the final proof."   
  
He wanted to die.  
  
"Don't." He responded as she pulled the door open just barely. She stilled, confusion in her eyes as she looked back at him.  
  
"What?" She asked, her hand slipping away from the doorknob. 

He was moving toward her before he understood what was happening, which seemed to be the trend of the night thus far. She watched him until he was so near her that she had to look up to keep eye contact.

"I said don't." He answered, reaching past her wrist to the door. Gently pushing it closed, he leaned in to the Woman as he had done earlier that night in a much different circumstance and for a much different reason. "Please."

Her head came to rest softly against his chest, as though she were exhausted... And it occurred to him that she probably was.

"Forgive me." He repeated, this time in a low and quiet voice in to her hair, pressing his hand firmly against the small of her back. He closed his eyes to take in her scent more thoroughly, though it was almost against his will. She gripped his arm, and his chest ached.

"I can't stay here."

He held her tighter at that. It was true, and he couldn't deny it. Not aloud or to himself.

"How am I meant to let you go?" He didn't know how that was supposed to come out, but the way it _did_ come out was as a plea. She let go of his arm.

"Like this." She said, twisting around and opening the door once again.

Quickly he took her by the wrist and turned her round to face him again, pushing her against the door, which resulted in it slamming shut behind her. His hands were braced at either side of her shoulders, and his torso was pressed so closely against hers that he could feel her breathe.

He wanted her again, badly... But though he somehow admittedly craved again the release her body had offered to him minutes before, it wasn't what he really wanted. He wanted more from her than physical intimacy. He wanted more than he could possibly ask for.

He wanted her to stay.

He had never realized before how absolute rubbish his resolve was... but then, it had previously never had occasion to be tested like this.

He leaned in slowly, his gaze moving from The Woman's eyes to her mouth once and then twice, and then sliding shut as his lips found hers. His whole body cried out in elation at the contact as though it had been waiting for this his entire life. He could hear the tune he'd composed for her in his head, note by note, and each carrying a wave of adoration that he let out in his kiss. Her lips parted and as her tongue slid gently against his he let out an agonized groan.

What the _hell_ was he doing?  
  
He didn't know. His whole life had been composed of hard facts and cold logic. He always knew his next step before he took it. He could read situations the way others read headlines in newspapers. The world just made sense to him. He could see it for what it was, how it moved, how it breathed. Even when things surprised him, they didn't really surprise him. The world and the people who lived in it adhered to patterns and rituals, and Sherlock had learned how to recognize these things years ago. Nothing ever shocked him or threw him, and so he always knew what to do when the time came to know.

Now, though? He couldn't see forward to the next moment let alone how he was going to force himself through the situation.

She pulled away, and Sherlock took the break in contact to try to reign in his breathing. 

"What do you want from me?" Irene posed Sherlock's question back at him. He stared down at her wet blue eyes absolutely not knowing the answer.

"Once you walk out of this flat, I will never see you again." He responded with a truth that had been pressing on his heart through out almost this whole encounter.

Irene pressed her mouth together in obvious frustration and pushed Sherlock away from her and took long steps toward his wardrobe before turning around to face him again.  
  
"What do you want from me, Sherlock?"  
  
What did he want? What did he _want_? He wanted for her never to have come here. He wanted for her never to have known his name. He wanted for her to not have dug her manicured nails so deeply and irrevocably through his heart. He hated her, he hated what she’d done, and he hated that she was in danger.

He hated that he loved her.

"You!" he growled, the last consonant barely out of her mouth.

She shook her head lightly, a tear finally escaping her eyes. 

"You _have_ me." She repeated what she had told him earlier, though this time she said it in a harrowingly entreating manner.   
  
"No, I don't." He responded angrily. Didn't she understand what she had done? "You're in danger. You can't stay with me. You can't stay here. You took your life in to your hands with that fantastically reckless power play, and now I _can't_ have you."

"Then let me go." She said, and another tear fell.

"I can't do that either!" He yelled, and The Woman started. His anger dissipated a bit at that, though he was no less frustrated... And as he stared at her, her cheeks red, her eyes wide with hurt, her whole life in ruins, he understood finally what he had been asking her to forgive him for. His tense stance slackened. "I'm sorry that you love me."  
  
Her face changed completely at that, and she suddenly looked for all the world like he had just slapped her.  
  
"I'm not quite convinced you know what love is."  
  
Sherlock raised his head at that, a bitter smirk at the side of his mouth.  
  
"I understand anything that can be dissected."  
  
The Woman's lips turned down as though she were impressed.

"Brilliant, professor." She responded mockingly.

Sherlock bit down.  
  
"I've spent years carefully avoiding sentimentality where I'm able and never encouraging it in others. However, as it turns out, sometimes I am _un_ able and others have been nonetheless encouraged. Don't assume that because I'm not dropping to one knee that I don't know what love is."

The Woman was silent, her expression shocked, and Sherlock immediately realized his mistake.

_The car backfires, and the hiker turns to look... Which was his big mistake._

It was going to take a fair amount of mental fortitude to convince her that what he had just said was not an accidental admission of his love for her, and he wasn't even sure that it was worth doing. He wasn't sure that he had it in him.

"Irene, I--"  
  
He was cut off, being pressed roughly against his door, his mouth captured in a fervent kiss, whatever words he was about to speak completely forgotten. He wrapped his arms around The Woman and poured all the love he would never be able to give her in to his caresses as he held on to her for what felt to him like dear life. He wanted this kiss, needed it, his heart and soul begged for it... He knew that whatever happened tonight, no matter what he or she said, no matter what they did, that tomorrow she would be gone. He couldn’t bear it, couldn't abide it, but it was nonetheless his reality.  
  
She said he had her, and tonight, the fabled "very last night" that she had spoken of earlier when he couldn’t possibly have understood, was the only night where it would be true. The only woman he had ever loved had walked in to his bedroom on the same night that she was to walk out of his life.

Sherlock's hand came up to firmly grasp a handful of her hair as his other hand felt the fabric of her dress. He pulled away from the fire of her kiss and stared intensely in to her eyes.

"Take. This. _Off_."  
  
She smiled in a way that Sherlock could only have described to himself as wicked, and though he might have admonished himself for the thought in any other circumstance, this time he just didn't care.  
  
"Yes, Mr. Holmes."

**...**

**TBC**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The line "I'd do anything to make you stay" in Irene's second email is actually a lyric I took from Florence and the Machine's song "No Light, No Light" which has been playing on repeat in my house ever since I started writing this story. It's supplied not just a little inspiration for me, so I hope you'll give it a listen if you haven't already heard it!
> 
> Fair warning: next chapter will have some mature bits!


	5. Good God

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to everyone who's stuck with me and this story so far! I appreciate every single moment of your time given over to Come Attrition, and I only hope that you keep enjoying what you're seeing.

  **Chapter 5: Good God**

**…**

**3 years Later**

Sherlock stared up at the ceiling of his room, light from the moon outside cascading in through his curtains. He couldn't sleep, but it didn't really bother him. He hadn't eaten in over 24 hours, though that didn't really bother him either. He hardly noticed these things at all.

A head against his shoulder and an arm across his chest accompanied by a soft inarticulate mumble pulled him out of his thoughts. He took a deep breath as his eyes slid shut.

_All for a case..._

"Sherl..." The soft voice whispered tiredly. Sherlock didn't respond. "I know you're awake."

He opened his eyes.

"I'm sorry." He responded. "I didn't want to bother you."

Janine's arm tightened around him as she nuzzled against his neck. She'd insisted on staying without insisting, something that she was quite good at. He wondered if all women were good at it.

"Can't sleep?" She asked, placing a kiss against where her mouth lay pressed against his pulse point. He resisted the urge to flinch; as such a show of disinterest wouldn't really do in this matter. It was not that she wasn't beautiful, as he could objectively see her aesthetic appeal, and it wasn't even that he was averse to intimate physical contact (though... he supposed he was - mostly), but it was that this was his space above all else. He believed he had the same line of thought years before when The Woman had intruded uninvited. This was where he came to be alone, and to be safe. He couldn't be either of those things with a woman in his bed.

Well, that wasn't completely true... but what did that matter? Janine wasn't the exception. And The Exception was gone.

"I was just thinking." Sherlock responded, falling in to his role with ease.

"Mm?" She asked, pressing her body closer to his. "What about?"

He twisted in place so that he faced her, breaking her contact from his neck and body, though her arm still lay across him.

"You're the only one who knows what I'm really like." He said, smiling at her. It was easy to give someone what they wanted once one knew what they wanted was. In this case, Janine had clearly been looking for someone to go home with, but more than that, she was looking for something long term. That had been clear at the wedding when she hadn't pursued Sherlock even though she had obvious interest in him. She hadn't been "in the market" for idle flirtation or even for a one off tryst, as evidenced by her first comment to him in the courtyard:

_But no sex, okay?_

She'd been looking for a boyfriend, and since Sherlock had quickly figured out who she was and whom she worked for, it was easy to plant the seed of infatuation that first night. He'd sealed the deal, as it were, with the fanciful pirouette in the hall of the wedding venue. After that, he knew that she would be ready and willing when his phone call came.

She placed a soft kiss against his lips that he widened his smile in to, while simultaneously feeling as though he were committing a gross act of injustice against her.

"I believe you." She responded lowly, her hand trailing over his hip. Sherlock knew that tone and touch well.

"You should sleep." He started, pulling away from her proximity a bit. "Early day tomorrow."  
  
Janine slumped against her pillow perceptibly. She had been trying to seduce Sherlock for the better part of 3 weeks now, but there were several reasons that he could never let his ruse escalate to that level. Firstly, and probably most importantly, he wasn't _actually_ that big of an arsehole. Well, perhaps he _could_ be if the situation really necessitated it, but so far it had not. Hopefully it _would_ not. Secondly, that kind of act would require a fair bit of brainpower, for reasons best left undisclosed even if they were only to himself, and he couldn't risk it. Not now. There was too much work to be done, and too many variables to keep track of. He simply couldn't afford it.  
  
And then, of course, there was the third reason.

"Not that early." She said, and he could hear the distinct edge of disappointment in her voice.

"I didn't just mean you. I have promises to keep."

"And miles to go before you sleep? You can't ply me with poetry forever, Sherlock Holmes." She responded sleepily, her amiable mood having quickly returned.

"Ply you? No. Forever?..." He smiled, and she smiled back...

And his heart actually ached.

Partly, he felt sorry for Janine. She wasn't so bad, really. She was beautiful, and even clever in her own way. She deserved a good man with good intentions, someone who really loved her the way that she was ready to love him.

Of course, that was only partly... and a small part at that.

He'd had only two nights with The Woman. One in which he was wholly unprepared for, and the other, which had been necessarily abbreviated, that had been quite painful and heart wrenching as feelings had already been established, and there wasn't enough time to...

 _To what?_ His mind asked mockingly.

He didn't want to think about this. He'd thought of Irene very little since he saved her life in Karachi, and had managed, almost, to not think of her at all since he'd sworn off reading her emails. He hadn't even logged in to that account since that day... But during these nights, with the wrong woman at his side, it was difficult, bordering on impossible, to keep his thoughts from turning to The Right Woman. She'd lain in this very bed with him, entwined with him, caressing his skin and smoothing her hand over his hair. Whispering things that he could not recall now for fear of audibly sighing at the memory.

He missed her, something he begrudgingly admitted to himself as he still could not reconcile feeling that emotion with the man he knew, or thought, that he was, but she was out of his life, and the memory of her lips against his was fading from his mind just as the scent of her perfume had faded from his sheets long ago. He had a long memory, a _complex_ memory, but even he could not keep her caresses tangible forever.

He couldn't have sex with Janine, or indeed with any woman, because he knew what it was like with someone he genuinely cared for and admired (was it love? He could never have been sure as he oscillated back and forth on the matter every time he had occasion to think about it, but his knee jerk instinct was always to try and doubt it)... and he didn't think his heart could stand the parody.

Frustrated with the thought, Sherlock clenched his fists. It didn't matter. None of this mattered. Abstinence was easy, so there was no point in remembering the two times in his whole life where it hadn't been. It was distracting and destructive, and completely uncharacteristic. It was best to pretend that part of him had never existed, because for all intents and purposes it didn't _now_ , and it never would again.

But it wasn't physical intimacy that was the problem, anyway. Not really. He had come to care for so few people in his life, that it felt like having one of them likely permanently removed from him was... unfair.

"Sherl...?"

"Mm?"

"Your heart's racing..."

Sherlock sat up suddenly.

"What are you--"  
  
"I'm just going for a drink of water." He interrupted her as he threw the blanket off of him and stepped out of bed.  
  
"Sherlock, are you--"  
  
Sherlock leaned down and kissed Janine chastely on the forehead before caressing her cheek for a moment.  
  
"I'm fine, darling." He said, trying the word out and then deciding never to use it again. "Get some rest. I'll be back in a moment."

He walked around the bed to where his blue dressing gown hung in his wardrobe and flung it over his bare body before opening his bedroom door and shutting it behind him once he was in the corridor.

He pressed the home button on his mobile, and the screen lit to life. Of course he'd grabbed it quickly as he passed his dresser... Because it had occurred to him, quite suddenly, that the last correspondence he had received from the woman had been after his faked suicide. It was possible, likely, that she had written to him since then.

Shaking as he walked toward the parlor, he accessed the proxy server he'd set up years ago, and began typing in the URL to his secure email. He paused a moment at the password prompt and wondered if this were not an incredibly bad idea, but then decided he didn't particularly care. He typed in his password, his body beginning to tremor slightly at the cold and the... fear? Dread? Anticipation?

Then the screen loaded.

Sherlock's heart all but stopped, and his breath caught completely in his chest.

He had two unread emails.

  _..._

 

_All for a case..._

What was? _This_ was? What _was_... this?

Sherlock lay back on the dirty mattress against the wall of the house that was once probably very beautiful, but was now just a shell of its former self. His mind could not manage, for the moment, even the most rudimentary of processes or deductions of which he was usually able as the rush of euphoria, from the needle still jabbed in his arm, enveloped and overwhelmed his senses. 

The Woman lay in a blur at his side.

"What are you doing here?" He asked, turning his head toward her. She didn't answer. She never really did. "I'm working."

Was that disappointment flickering like a candle over her face? No, because there was no face. There was no candle. There was no woman.

Sherlock closed his eyes and breathed deeply, knowing, but not completely understanding, that he was crossing a line here that he probably shouldn't have been crossing. Not even for... whatever reason he had for doing it, but that was currently escaping him. He knew John would be disappointed. Molly would be disappointed. Mary might even be disappointed, but would The Woman? No. She'd never know about this, would she?

"Who cares?" He thought, but more likely said aloud. "I don't care. I don't care about anything."

_But we both know that's not quite true..._

"Shut up." Sherlock spat at his dead nemesis. "I won, didn't I?"

No answer. Moriarty never really answered.

Sherlock pulled the needle from his arm, and tossed it toward the floor. Turning over on to his side, he forsook thought and decided that sleep would be a more comfortable state to spend the rest of his stupor in. This would be the last night he did this, he promised himself. No more of this. Not even for a case...

Not even to forget...

But then... he heard the sound of his friend's voice, speaking to someone that wasn't him. Judging by the enhanced clarity of his thoughts, he had actually been asleep for some time, though he was still very decidedly high.  
  
Of course it wasn't really John. He hadn't seen or heard from John since the wedding. What would he be doing here, in a drug den?  
  
Sherlock turned over to be confronted with the back of his friend, and figured it was just another hallucination conjured up from his drug addled brain and he figured... what was the harm in indulging it?  
  
"Oh, hello, John." He said, pulling his hood down. "Didn't expect to see you here." The look of complete surprise on Fake John's face was quite convincing as he slowly turned to Sherlock. "Have you come for me, too?"

* * *

 **3 years earlier**  

 

Irene's eyes remained intently on Sherlock's as her arms went up to the top of the zip at the back of her dress. Sherlock caught her suddenly by the wrists, and slowly pulled them back down to her side.

"Not that." He said. He let her wrists go, and taking her chin in his hand, turned her face toward the light. " _This_."

The Woman searched his eyes, but he said nothing more.

She reached up and encircled his wrist in her fingers.

"Why?" She asked.

Why? There were so many "whys" tonight, that he didn't think he'd ever be able to sort through them all... So many "whys" that didn't have answers, or that couldn't have answers, or that he didn't _want_ to answer. But this? This was simple.

He searched for the right words. She didn't need it, that was certain. In truth she looked better without it. Her features were too angular and aristocratic for the deep and contrasting colors. The makeup aged her, and was harsh against her pale skin. Earlier in the day when she had been here willfully putting the whole of the western world in jeopardy, she had appeared far softer and far more attractive - something he'd noted with detachment at the time.

But that didn't matter. If physical appearance was what drew him to people, he could find a pretty girl anywhere... And anyway, Irene would have been intriguing even if he were blind.

"You don't need to wear a mask." He finished finally.

 _With me_ , his mind added, though he assumed it had been implied.

"I..." She seemed quite taken aback. She clearly had taken his earlier demand as sexual, but appeared at a loss to be confronted with this instead. Her world had been all about using her sexuality and cunning to get what she wanted from people, and from life, and so she must have been very comfortable in that realm. Yet, he thought, it couldn't have been the whole story, as much as she was probably loath to accept that there was a different part of her... much as the same as Sherlock was.

"It's water based." He said as he moved his hand from her chin and ran a finger down the streaks on her face, more to illustrate his point than to caress her. "You've chosen products that are easy to remove. If you'd wanted it to last, if this was the true face you'd chosen for yourself... you'd have used something that wouldn't just wash away with water." He paused. "Or tears."

She seemed to stiffen a bit at that.

"I rarely cry."  
  
"Does that make me special?" He asked her, calling back to the day he discovered that she was still alive at the Battersea power complex when she had asked that of John. He knew it might be bit cruel to bring it up now, but he couldn't resist the parallel.

"No." She answered plainly and probably, he thought, defensively.

Sherlock smiled darkly, either because he believed her, or because he didn't, but he wasn't sure which. He didn't _want_ to know which, either. Without taking his eyes off of her, he opened the door to his right. Irene stared up at him, clearly uncomfortable at having no semblance of an upper hand, and seemingly unwilling to do what he was asking her. There was probably some symbolism at work here, but there was far too much to think about as it was, and so he ignored the idea.

"You think I'm just going to--"

"Yes." He interrupted her with the curt answer for the second time in the night.

 "I have to leave now." She responded quietly, still maintaining eye contact.

The same pain from earlier erupted subtly beneath Sherlock's ribcage, and he realized wearily that she was, of course, correct...

 He took a step back from her as he raised his chin, and then stepped away from her entirely. 

"Willing to take off your clothes, but not your makeup." He paused, and then with something of a sneer: "Interesting."

She took a step toward him, clear anger on her face.

"And you?" She asked, gesturing toward the bed. Sherlock didn't look. "Willing to sleep with me, but not willing to admit any emotional attachment."  
  
"And is that what you think I feel toward you?" He asked. "Emotional _attachment_." The last word came out as though he meant it as an insult toward her, and he understood that it was partly because he had. Attachment. Sentiment. _Love_. All of these words were horribly misrepresentative of what it was that he felt, and what she was to him; what she had been becoming for the last few months. Boiling it all down to a single thing was disgustingly reductive, and the whole thing was beginning to offend him.

She looked hurt, and he couldn't make himself care for the moment. He was hurting, too, and there was little sense in feeling it by himself.

"Why did you ask me to stay?"

"Because you're going out there to die, and I can't protect you." He said bluntly.

She laughed softly.

"Sherlock." She said almost on an exhale. "You never could."

She had meant that to sting, and it did. She was right. He had been in the dark too much of the time to really know what he had been up against, and that wounded a part of him that was typically too indelible for others to touch. She'd made him a pawn in a bigger game, one that she'd made certain he was too distracted to see... and even as she lay in ruins at his feet, he had to accept the truth of the matter.

She had beaten him.

"You could have brought your case to _me_." He hissed, hurt permeating through his pride and heart, the insinuation clear that she never had to involve Moriarty in the first place. 

She scoffed.  
  
"Right." She said, nodding. "The consulting detective... Tell me," She looked him up. "If you can stop Moriarty, why haven't you already done it?"  
  
He opened his mouth only to find that he had no words, and then pressed his lips together.

 "You must see." She said in a bemused tone, tilting her head. " _He_ holds the cards. He finds _us_... Not the other way round."

This was bad, and it was only getting worse. Nothing made sense in his world, and Sherlock was beginning to feel like a caged animal with no recourse but to lash out.

"Why did you come here?" He growled.

And then something occurred to him.

Suddenly Sherlock was in a bedroom in a sunny flat in Belgravia, the deep wood of the floor reflecting some of the light from behind the gossamer drapes. He turned to the door beside the bed where Irene Adler, clothed only in his coat, stood staring. There was a look in her eyes reminiscent of a feral cat as he slowly walked toward her.

"Why did you come?" He asked, walking around her. As he moved, she began walking toward her vanity. He remembered this was when he had turned away from her, when he'd given her a chance to grab the needle from wherever she had been stowing it. He'd turned away only for a moment, had underestimated her, and she had done what she had to do to regain control.   
  
Irene turned to Sherlock with the needle in hand.

"You touched my arm." He said quietly, his eyes squinted as he began to piece it all together. "To distract me."

She was in front of him now, and jabbing the needle through the fabric of his shirt and in to his flesh.

Then the haze cleared, and Sherlock was once again looking at the real Irene Adler who stood in front of him in his bedroom - her eyebrows knit together in a frown as she spoke."  
  
"--ening to m--"  
  
"Where's your coat?" Sherlock asked, interrupting whatever The Woman was saying.  
  
She looked startled.  
  
"My coat?"  
  
"Yes, your coat." He responded in a harsh tone for having to repeat it. "It was cold outside. Raining. You'd have a matching posh coat to go with that dress, and you would have worn it on a night like tonight." He paused, looking around. "But where is it?"

"This is absurd."

"Indulge me."  
  
Irene swallowed visibly, her gaze wavering.  
  
"Underneath the bed." She responded.  
  
Sherlock raised his head, his hands going behind his back.  
  
"With your shoes, I imagine."

The Woman said nothing.

"You took your shoes off downstairs, after all you couldn't have known if I would have beaten you here. If you were trying to sneak up on me, your heels on the wooden steps would have given you away. You made it to my bedroom and were satisfied that I was still out, so you hid the shoes and your coat, with your drugged needle concealed inside, underneath the bed and waited."

She met his eyes full on, defiance replacing anxiety or fear.

"Clever." She said shortly.

 Sherlock's lips pulled slightly back in a morbid version of a smile.

"It's why you won't take your makeup off and why you wanted me to tell you I love you. You're not here for sentimentality's sake. You're here to finish your game. Tell me... after you'd drugged me again, just what exactly was the next step in your plan?"  
  
"What if I said I was going to kill you?"  
  
"I wouldn't believe it."  
  
"I've killed people before."  
  
"In self defense." He countered. "After tonight, I would not have been a threat to you ever again." He shook his head. "No. And just now, you were prepared to leave with your belongings still hidden beneath my bed, prepared to let me eventually find them and come to my own conclusions."

"You always do."

She stared at him silently, and Sherlock could feel the cool veneer over his own expression beginning to crack. He had never felt heartbreak, or if he had he had not recognized it as such at the time... but this? Losing to The Woman, giving himself to her like a fool, admitting to himself what he felt for her, knowing he was going to lose her... Nothing compared to this. He couldn't trust her or her motives. He couldn't even trust that she wasn't still working with Moriarty. He had ignored what he knew about her even as he embraced it, and it had been a mistake now just as it had been all along.

She loved him, but love was as useless to her as it was to him, and it wouldn't stop her from hurting him if she could. This was the only kind of love that could ever exist between the two of them.

"So, yes." Sherlock said, biting down against a rather unpleasant onslaught of emotion. "You were in the middle of leaving. So sorry to have interrupted."  
  
He didn't expect the tears that formed just at the brim of her eyes at that.  
  
"I brought it for protection." She spoke as though she were relenting, as though she were giving something up.  
  
"I'm not in the habit of hurting defenseless women."  
  
And that, of course, like her earlier jab at him, was also meant to sting. He doubted she had ever felt like a defenseless woman before tonight.  
  
She smiled ruefully, as though she'd deserved that.

"Not against you."

"Then why hide it?"  
  
"You just proved the why." She paused, and Sherlock said nothing. "You want me to take my makeup off?" She nodded and then looked toward the door Sherlock had opened for her earlier before walking through it without another word. He listened as the rush of water began pouring against the sink basin.

 He walked toward the bathroom entranceway, and stepped in just enough to see her bent over the sink with soap in her hands, about to press them against her face.

"Stop." He said. She looked over at him, hands halted. There was nothing more to say than what he was going to in the next moment. "I don't love you."

He couldn't love her. He couldn't allow it. He had always had a large degree of control of his feelings, and after tonight, after Irene was well and truly gone, he would go back to who he was before any of this happened. He couldn't give her more than what he already had, and what's more he couldn't trust her enough to give it even if he could. Even if she had brought her fun little needle of sleep for something other than to drug him in to oblivion, it only mattered that he had _suspected_ her of something worse. He would always suspect her, because she would always be capable of it.

But then, she said something he couldn't possibly have been prepared for.

"I know."

Sherlock's face softened, and the heavy look of suspicion died away from his eyes.

_I know..._

It was such a seemingly innocuous thing to say. A phrase said and heard thousands of times, in response to thousands of different things... And yet it had a different meaning this time.

She closed her eyes and was about to bring her soapy hands to her face when Sherlock, who had not noticed his own approach took her by the wrist for another of many times in the night and stopped her. She looked at him, the room silent but for the sound of the water as he brought her hands down to the stream and gently rinsed them clean. He took a hand towel from where it hanged on the wall and held it under the faucet for a few moments, before turning the water off completely. He had no idea what The Woman was doing or thinking as she watched him, as he couldn't bring himself to look at her right away... But when he did, the look of awe on her face was breathtaking.

He brought the towel to the skin at her temple and gently caressed it down her cheek.  
  
"Water based." He nearly whispered, then looked her in the eyes for a moment, before placing a kiss at the warm wet temple he had just wiped clean. She watched him quietly, her chest raising and falling heavily. He ran the cloth down the other side of her face, and then placed a soft kiss there as well, and he could feel her close her eyes against it, and he took the opportunity to gently press the warm cloth to first one eyelid, and then the other... his lips trailing after.  
  
At first, the feel of her mouth against his was surreal, as he hadn't been sure he'd ever feel it again. He had lost count of how many times he'd kissed The Woman tonight, and couldn't recall the many different ways he had done it... but, even so, this was different. His heart began to pound furiously against his chest, and he could feel it in his throat. The sense of euphoria that accompanied it was almost enough to make him give up his name for the promise of more.  
  
But there was no promise of more. This affair had already outlasted its own lifespan.  
  
"Why?" She asked, breathless, as she pulled away from his kiss and pressed her forehead against his. He backed her in to the sink.  
  
"I don't know." He responded truthfully, because he absolutely didn't. He pressed himself in to her, causing her to partially hold her weight up on the sink basin, steadying her with his hand held against the small of her back.  
  
He didn't know why he felt the need to give in again after having sworn to himself he never would, but he did know now why God hadn't answered his pathetic prayer earlier in the night when he had wished for a pack of cigarettes in the rain. It wasn't because Sherlock didn't believe in him, but it was because he believed in something else entirely. Irene had got it right upon their first meeting... He believed in himself as his own higher power, but The Woman had shown up in his life and had torn everything apart from the bottom up, and he couldn't help but be in awe of her. He couldn't stop himself from loving the very thing that was going to rip him to pieces starting from the inside. The worst part was that he knew it was going to happen, knew it was _happening_ , yet here he was prepared to worship at her alter once again...  
  
And he just didn't give a damn.

There would be no more questioning. No more fighting himself, or feeble attempts to reassert his nature or character. He didn't know what he was feeling, didn't know what was going to happen when the world started spinning again and Irene Adler walked out of this flat with his heart bleeding in her hands... but his sense of self preservation was in tatters and if Irene was doing this purposely, if she was planning on holding his head under water until he could no longer breathe, then he was going to let her.

He took her mouth with his lips and was rewarded with the silky caress of her tongue as he roughly hiked her skirt up around her thighs. She groaned against him and he threw the towel down to the floor at his feet, right next to his better judgment.

He could feel her hands working at his trouser button and immediately a rush of arousal made itself known in a wave of adrenaline and jolt of his heart. She had said she knew he didn't love her, and he couldn't tell her otherwise, it was the last impenetrable wall around his sense of self... but he would show her. He could do that. He could allow that.

He leaned back from her as his trousers and pants dropped to the floor, reaching behind him to the shower and with a quick few turns of his wrist, the sound of the water spray filled the room. He leaned back in to Irene, deepening the kiss that he had momentarily broken, hurriedly kicking the fabric at his feet away while she worked the buttons of his shirt unclasped one by one until frantically pushing it down and off of his arms. With one hand he nearly ripped The Woman's knickers down her exposed thighs, the other tangling in to the hair at the base of her head. The feel of the fabric of her dress against his bare skin added to his sense of... something. Something he couldn't define, but that he felt she would be able to describe thoroughly. He only knew that what he was feeling was lust and longing, and the deepest need he'd ever felt before. 

"I could have come here to kill you." She panted in to the air as she reached down and pulled the lace the rest of the way off of her body, and he pressed open-mouthed kisses against the hollow of her neck.

 "It can wait."

He jerked his hips forward suddenly and without warning, and Irene cried out in a sound of deep pleasure.

"Oh god." She sighed against his ear. He kissed a line up to hers and then shook his head.  
  
"Not quite."

Just what exactly he was doing, and the precise amount of damage he was dealing to himself and his life, he was unsure of. He knew there would be repercussions that would likely ripple outward from this night, far and away through the weeks, and months, and years, and that he was inviting all of it upon his own head...

But The Woman was demanding a sacrifice, and Sherlock would be damned if she didn't get one.

* * *

  **3 Years Later**

Sherlock sat in the darkness of his parlor, the hand that held his mobile limp at his side.

The first email had been short. Only one word this time. A question.

 _How?_  
  
She wanted to know how. How had he survived the fall? How was he still alive?  
  
The second email, sent 3 months after the first, was almost as short, but true to form... was much more painful to read. Even as he ruminated on the emotions that crashed against him unrelentingly in the cold and the dark, he knew that this was the end. He knew that what he and The Woman had spun in to motion that night in his bedroom what seemed a lifetime ago, was well and completely over. She had changed everything for him that night, and she was doing it again now.

The last time he had looked at this inbox, he had told himself he never would again, because the messages were nothing but detrimental. He had wished that he had never met Irene Adler, and that was never truer than at this moment.

He stood slowly, and began the walk back to his bedroom where Janine awaited him, and as he put distance between him and his chair, he imagined memories melting off of him and landing in puddles on the floor behind him.

He opened his bedroom door, stepped in, and closed it. Dropping his dressing gown in a heap by the side of the bed along with his mobile, he slid underneath the blanket next to the woman who lay between the sheets. 

For the first time, he pulled in tightly toward Janine and conformed himself to the outline of her body, her back pressed to his chest.

"Hold a girl like that, and she might think you love her." Janine said sleepily, and Sherlock's arms unconsciously tightened around her, and then he consciously made the decision to pull her round to face him. She smiled lazily up at him.

"She might just be right." He responded, leaning down and pressing his cold lips against hers. She responded immediately, wrapping her arms around his neck. He clenched his eyes closed as her tongue touched his, his heart hardening, and his resolve strengthening.

He had always known it was going to end, and as his lips moved against the lips of a woman whom he would never love, he realized it had ended long before this night... It had ended the night Irene sent her last email.

  
_Goodbye, Mr Holmes._

**_..._ **

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> To be clear, I'm not implying that Sherlock and Janine are going to have sex. :) 
> 
> On to part 6!


	6. Transient

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello! Happy 2015 - the year in which new Sherlock episodes will be released! Today, in honor of Sherlock Holmes' birthday, and in honor of Sherlock filming finally being underway (WOOOOO!), I offer my small token of appreciation to the fandom. :)
> 
> A few notes: 
> 
> 1) Part 6 sees a return to the plot line set up some chapters ago, for anyone who was wondering where the hell that was going. Just to be clear, I'm not just jumping around randomly to wherever the muse dictates. There's a center gravity here that everything is being pulled toward, and if I've carried it off at the end you should be able to see it. I hope. *crosses fingers*
> 
> 2) This chapter is definitely M, but only about as M as any of the previous chapters have been.
> 
> 3) And lastly, and perhaps most importantly… the timeline. I've read through timelines on the internet, and I've just now sat through a viewing of the whole of series 2, and I'm still somewhat at a loss. It seems to me that the writers of the show kind of play fast and loose with dates and the passing of time, so I'm going to keep what I've written for now. If a better timeline comes along, I'll switch it over to that. If you notice any glaring inconsistencies, please feel free to let me know!
> 
> Thank you again to all of my wonderful, lovely, immensely appreciated readers! I'm as nervous as ever to post this latest installment, but I hope you enjoy it.

**Chapter 6: Transient**

**...**

  
"I don't know how to play this game."  
  
Sherlock looked around the sunlit room, feeling dazed and uncertain... partly as to the game he was trying to play, and partly as to why he was in The Woman's sitting room. There were lots of reasons why he shouldn't have been here, he knew... though none of them in particular would come to him.

The Woman, clothed in his blue dressing gown, sat next to him on the settee with her legs tucked up underneath her. The sunlight bathed her in an odd, almost ethereal glow. Her hair hung in soft curls around her shoulders, and her face was clean and pale and beautiful.

She was nothing short of glorious to him.  
  
"Surely you do." She responded to him with a smile. Sherlock looked over the table where the pieces of whatever game they were playing lay scattered, but none of it made sense to him. He didn't know how long they had been playing this, or even why. "You had a childhood, didn't you?"  
  
He looked back at The Woman and stared for an infinite moment in to her smile before he had to look away as though averting his eyes from the sun. Something inside of him swelled and hurt, and he felt that if he paid it attention for too long that he would remember what was causing it... And he didn't want to remember. He didn't want to know why the sense of emptiness loomed heavy around him. The idea that he would ever have to confront it filled him with cold dread, and he felt that if he could just remember the rules to this game that he would never have to feel the loss that threatened to consume him whole.

Sherlock swallowed, and tried to focus on the words written on the different corners of the board, though they seemed almost to be gibberish.

"Debatable." He responded, and his throat felt tight.

"Oh, come now. Stop it." The Woman chided. "You grew up in a perfectly happy household. Where does the misanthropy come from?"

"Intelligence." Sherlock answered with another short answer, feeling horribly disoriented and quite unable to get any of his bearings.

"Sherlock..." The Woman said, and she suddenly sounded worried, or frightened. Sherlock's breath caught in his chest as he looked over at her, because he knew she was going to cause him pain. All she ever did was cause him pain. "You're playing the wrong game."

"What?" He asked urgently. "I don't understand."  
  
"Do you love me?"

Sherlock felt heavy and warm, but he knew the answer to this question. He'd known the answer to this question for an eternity, and he could tell her now. Nothing was stopping him.

"I--"

She pressed her finger to his mouth.  
  
"Shhh..." She said, and smiled a small smile as she moved her hand to caress his cheek. He leaned his face in to it and closed his eyes against it for just a moment. "I know you do." 

"No you don't." He answered her sadly. 

Her face changed at that, her eyes becoming far away and frightened.  
  
"Find me." She asserted. Sherlock's hand came up to hold hers against his cheek. "Sherlock, you have to find me."  
  
All at once he could feel his heart shattering in to pieces that would forever be too small to settle back in to place again. This was what he was forgetting, what he had lost. It was her. It was always her. 

"I will." He said desperately, but she was already gone. "I swear to you."

 

**...**

  
"What?" John asked.  
  
Sherlock's eyes slowly slid open, and John Watson came in to view hovering above him.  
  
"John..." He started, and his tongue felt heavy in his mouth, and his heart felt like dead weight in his chest.  
  
"Impressive, that." The Doctor said. "You were out after one punch. I thought it was going to take at least two."

Sherlock's face contracted in confusion, and he forcefully shoved the traumatic dream he had just awaken from to the back of his mind. He couldn't allow himself to wallow in the particular agony it had caused him just now for sanity's sake alone, and furthermore he knew there was something more pressing at the moment.

"What are you...?" He trailed off as the events of the day came back to him in full force.  He dropped his head back against the Union Jack pillow that was behind him on the sofa with an exhale and a roll of his eyes. "I'm sure you would have watched patiently, however long it took."

John pursed his lips in a shrug and shook his head slightly.

"Well, I wouldn't have let him kill you. I'd have stopped him after 4 or 5."

With the lingering effects of his dream still holding on tightly to his chest, Sherlock nearly found himself wishing that John had just let the old man beat him to a pulp. Then maybe he'd have jostled some sense back in to his brain... because he had been on short supply of that for months now.  

"Is it my fault that I'm right all the time?"

The anger that seeped out of his voice was directed more at himself than at his friend, but it didn't make a difference.

"No, I think that might be your parents' fault. What _is_ your fault is how you told those poor people about their daughter."  
  
"What does it matter how they found out?" Sherlock asked exasperatedly, his eyes opening once again as he sat up heavily. "Dead is dead no matter how many bouquets of roses you throw at it."

John stared at him in awe.

"Maybe I _should_ have let him hit you again."  
  
Sherlock's hand went to his temple.  
  
"It feels like you did." A beat. "And what's Mycroft doing here?"  
  
"How did you--"  
  
Mycroft stepped in from the corridor with the red worded birthday card and John's sonic screwdriver in hand, looking put out and mock surprised. Sherlock was able to keep his face from showing any immediate reaction to seeing the card again, though he wasn't able to keep his pulse from speeding up. There were many reasons why he couldn't allow Mycroft to know where the card had come from, the least of which being that he wasn't quite willing to let him or John know the extent of his relationship with Irene Adler... the largest of which being that Mycroft couldn't be trusted not to use the information in a way that wouldn't be dangerous for her.  
  
He wouldn't willingly put Irene in more danger. Not again.            

"Thirty seconds." He said. "You're slipping."

There it was. Their favorite thing to say to one another.

"If you'll recall, I _was_ just beaten unconscious."  
  
"Not for the first time." Mycroft responded with a smile, then it faded away as quickly as it had shown up. "Who sent the card, Sherlock?"  
  
Sherlock stiffened his jaw defiantly.

"Didn't leave a name."

Mycroft laughed shortly.  
  
"Who do you think I am?" He asked. "John?"

 John looked slightly to the left for a moment as though to roll his eyes, but otherwise did not respond to the comment.

"Well, then why don't you tell _me_ who sent it?" Sherlock asked, gesturing toward the card in his brother's hand.

"Oh, I have ways of figuring it out, of course... but I would rather save the British government the time and resources."   
  
Sherlock blinked.  
  
"And what is that supposed to be? Incentive?"  
  
"I just thought perhaps for once in your life you would like to be helpful rather than obstructive."

"Shall I introduce you two, then?" John asked sarcastically.  
  
Mycroft sighed.

"You've no doubt noticed the suspicious behaviors of several persons of interest, the string of murders--"

"There," Sherlock interrupted, pointing at his brother but looking at John. "Mycroft knows they're murders, too. Should we get the old man back in here to revisit his anger on _his_ face now?"

"Does this have any connection to the Charing Cross woman?" Mycroft continued, raising his voice in irritation and holding the card out in front of him. Sherlock stood suddenly and grabbed it out of his brother's hand, staring him intently in the eyes.

"I don't know who sent it." He asserted once more, his jaw set.  
  
Mycroft held Sherlock's gaze silently for a moment.

"I trust that if you find yourself in the possession of information that pertains to the welfare of the country, that you will contact me immediately." The older brother articulated gravely, his face dour. "We wouldn't want a repeat of the Heathrow incident." He smiled, though it didn't reach the corners of his mouth let alone his eyes. "Would we?"

Sherlock raised his chin, but said nothing.

Mycroft kept his eyes on his brother for a second longer, and then turned to John.

"Here's your toy." He said, handing the doctor his sonic screwdriver.  
  
"It's a pen." Sherlock responded for his friend who, for his part, took the device and discontentedly tossed it on to the table.

Mycroft all but rolled his eyes as he exited the room toward the steps. Sherlock unceremoniously slammed the door shut behind him.

"'A repeat of Heathrow.'" he intoned mockingly, then looked at John who had his arms crossed over his chest. "He's always so..." He stopped speaking as he noticed the expectant way that his friend was looking at him. "What?"

"You know what."

"No I don't, or else I wouldn’t have asked 'what?'"

John unlocked his arms and gestured at the card in Sherlock's balled fist.

"Why did you lie?"   
  
Sherlock thought briefly about unloading the whole thing on to his friend's shoulders, because maybe he could actually help... but as it stood, he didn't think that was the case. Telling him now would needlessly complicate the matter, and the whole situation was complicated as it was.

Sherlock, instead, said nothing.

"Listen, if you know something, you should tell Mycroft and be done with it."

Sherlock looked toward the door.

"I don't know anything yet." He said as he looked back to the doctor.   
  
John let out a short laugh.  
  
"What about Irene Adler?"  
  
Sherlock's gaze narrowed in startled reaction.  
  
"What?"  
  
"She was working with Moriarty. She might know something."

Sherlock shook his head as he pressed his mouth together in a firm line.

"Yes, and she's very likely dead." He announced definitively enough to where it caused his own heart to recoil from it. John tilted his head and waited for an explanation. "You think Mycroft let her go so that she could lead a carefree life of leisure? As soon as I broke her passcode, she became the most wanted criminal in Britain... There have been four murders now. If Jim Moriarty is the cause, then how much would you like to wager against her still being alive?"

John was silent and looked over Sherlock's face as though trying to read his expression.

"Do you really think she's dead?"  
  
At that question, Sherlock realized something with a sickening and dropping feeling of his stomach. God knew what had gone on in the time since the card had been sent, and God knew what Moriarty was capable of doing.  
  
_I'll make you in to shoes..._

Sherlock swallowed against the fear and panic that was beginning to pool around his consciousness. He couldn't let it affect him now.

"It doesn't matter." He said as he opened the door and started toward the steps. 

"Where are you going?"  
  
Sherlock looked up at John from two steps down.  
  
The truth was that it was possible everyone he cared for was in danger now. If Moriarty was sending messages, it wasn't long before he sent one to Sherlock. The first step was finding out if The Woman was safe. After that, whether she was alive or dead, he would have to forget about her... because soon would be the time where Moriarty would have to be stopped, and it was going to take the whole of his mental acuity and awareness. Sentiment, as always, was a disadvantage, and one that he now made the decision to bar himself against. Once and for all.

"To finish that conversation with my brother."

 

* * *

**One Month Earlier**

 

Sherlock had never been in love, had never even been close to being in love, but as The Woman tangled her hands through his hair, and as their bodies moved together in unison, he thought that if _this_ was love... he had been smart to stay clear away from it in the past.

 If someone had been studying Sherlock and his methods, his life and his interactions, one might have come away with the idea that he avoided interpersonal relationships as a way to protect himself from sorrow or rejection. While that would have been an _interesting_ interpretation, it would also have been completely incorrect. He hadn't avoided love to protect himself... he hadn't had to _avoid_ it at all, because there had never been a useful application for it in his life. His mind, his work, and his skills - they made him a complete man, fulfilled in every way that mattered to him. Then John came along and then he mattered, too. Which made things harder. Mrs. Hudson. Lestrade. They all made things harder.

Each new person creating a hole deep enough in Sherlock's heart to crawl in to and cause trouble... And grief.

Caring _was_ grief. And now there was this. Now there was more. Too much to process or understand. If this was love, if this was what being in love felt like, he hated himself for letting it happen, and he hated Irene for being the anomaly that forced it out of him.

_Caring is not an advantage. Sherlock._

Sherlock let out a muffled groan in to The Woman's slick and weighted down hair as he pushed her against the wet shower wall, her nails digging in to his hips.

"You're going to regret me." Irene panted in to his ear as he moved against her, the steam from the hot water beginning to fill completely in around them.

And that caused its own kind of pain, too, because he already did regret her... and didn't.

He couldn't respond to that, he could hardly even think anymore. All he knew was that he wanted this, _needed_ it, and that the hurt thrumming its way through his veins demanded that he had her now, completely and thoroughly.

"You said I have you." He rasped against her cheek. "Do I?"

The Woman pulled away far enough to lock her blue eyes sharply with his, and there was sadness in her gaze that made Sherlock's hands tighten on the flesh at her sides.

"Yes." She said simply.

Sherlock buried his head in her neck and clenched his eyes closed. He knew it was true, and that this was the only night that it would be. His chest burned, and very little of anything was making sense. How many hours ago was it that he had known who he was? It couldn't have been long, but the Sherlock Holmes in Mycroft's study who tore Irene Adler's life down bit by bit as he viciously dialed the letters of his own name in to her camera phone, was not the Sherlock Holmes who now held on to that same woman as though for dear life. Something had changed. Everything had changed.

He'd fallen in love.

No. That didn't follow. The change had occurred sometime between him stepping out of his brother's home, and him stepping in to his own bedroom. Whatever it had been, whatever it was, wasn't love... because he must have been in love with Irene long before this night.

And that thought, so effortlessly arrived at, Shocked Sherlock so much that his breath caught and his body went rigid for a moment.

"Don't." Irene whispered.

"No..." Sherlock responded quietly, allowing his body to relax in to hers. "Not now."

Not now, because this was it. He'd admitted completely to himself that he was in love, and instead of freeing him it had caged him. Sentenced him. He'd never be the same, even though he _wanted_ desperately to be the same.  It was fitting that he'd moved them to the shower, as there was a deep desire inside of him to wash these feelings, the disastrous events of the day - of the last few months, the pain, the _change_ , away. 

"Sherlock..." She intoned in a breathless shudder, and the whole of his body was suddenly tingling from the sound.

Even as he had to almost physically will his traitorous heart to keep beating in the face of its own distress, he pulled away and looked at The Woman. 

Her makeup was completely washed away now, and her dark hair was matted to her scalp. He realized what he must have looked like to her at that moment... and it occurred to him that there was nothing between them now. No disguises, not ulterior motives, no pretenses, and no need to hurt the other.

And this was all they were ever going to have.

Sherlock ran his hand over her hair and her cheek, his breathing quick and labored.  
  
"You're..." He shook his head, unable to find the word. He searched his mind for a moment, but every word that came before him seemed inane or cliché. Nothing captured what he wanted to say... So he gave up.

Irene smiled, and there were even less words to describe that.

He pushed against her suddenly, and her smile disappeared with the familiar erotic sound that had been Sherlock's text tone for months. He pushed against her again, and again the sound escaped her.

Then again and again, until the pace and stimulation was almost unbearable, until The Woman was crying out repeatedly in to his ear, until his heart threatened to finally give out.

It wasn't enough. He was already close to coming undone, and this _wasn't_ enough. He couldn't let this end. Once it ended, she was gone. She was _gone_.  
  
"Oh, God..." Sherlock groaned, his forehead and hands pressing against the slick tile next to Irene's head, her hands tight around his waist. "I--"

It almost slipped out then. The admission he swore he would never give her, but he was able to catch it at the last moment. Not because he was afraid of letting her inside of his walls, but because he couldn't allow himself to do that to her.

Irene's fingers were pressing in to him almost painfully now, but he invited it. He invited every physical sensation that washed over him along with the rush of water that pounded against his shoulders and blotted out the outside world. It was just the two of them now. For once. Just this once. He fought to keep hold of this moment, tried to make it stretch out for a lifetime, but he could feel it slipping through his grasp.

Irene began to tremor against him, around him, and her cries died in to a deeply held breath that she couldn't seem to let go.

 _Not yet_ , something inside of him screamed, but it was too late. The moment was over. She was already gone, and he was going with her.

This time was different. Where the instance before this had been a rush of confusion and lust and release, this was something else entirely. He was allowing himself to love her now, to hold her, to be the kind of man who could have this in his life. For one dreadful and wonderful moment, he allowed himself to belong to her.

And then that moment was gone, too.  
  
The world came back now. The heat from the shower became stifling, the water too abrasive, the pounding in his chest overwhelming. He closed his eyes to it all and swallowed, trying to reign in his breathing.  
  
"Don't go." he found himself saying before his mind had even caught back up.  
  
Irene reached over and twisted the shower knob, and the water stopped.

"Stop." He said, this time with more will behind it, trying to catch her gaze.

Irene said nothing as she pushed gently against him, her face a mask of cool resolve. He blocked her exit from the shower, shaking his head. He couldn't take that. Not after she had been so open to him just a second before. He knew this had to happen, he knew that she had to go, and that it had to be now, but it was too much to tolerate.   
  
"Not _yet_."  
  
Dear God, he was _begging_. He could hear the desperation in his own voice and was repelled by his weakness, but the words had already been said and he could now only stand in the wake of them.  
  
Irene placed a soft hand on his forearm, and met his eyes with hers that were completely empty now.  
  
"Let me go."  
  
Sherlock searched her eyes for any trace of the emotion that had been able to take his breath away, but she was concealing it all from him now. Whether it was meant to make it easier on him or herself, he didn't know... but he had to nearly laugh at the cruel irony of the situation.

His lips quirked up in to a sneer of their own volition.

"Of course, Ms Adler."   
  
He stepped out of her way, and she moved passed him and out of the shower.

Sherlock braced himself against the tile with both hands and closed his eyes tight as The Woman took a towel from the wall, and walked back in to his bedroom.

In one night he and The Woman had played out the entirety of a relationship, and now it was over.

Now he had to remember how to be Sherlock Holmes.

* * *

**Six Months Later**

 

"What do you need?"

 What did he need? For the first time in his life he needed reassurance and comfort, but he couldn't ask for that. He was so alone and so... For God's sake, he was _helpless_. Almost everything had gone exactly according to plan, and yet here he was on the brink of breakdown because in the end it had been so easy to deconstruct his life...

It hadn't occurred to him until just this night what he and Mycroft had overlooked. This had never been only about destroying Sherlock's reputation. It had been about burning the heart out of him... Burning his name, his friends, and his life. He'd already gotten the first out of the way, and that meant his friends were next. The only bargaining chip Moriarty had _left_ was Sherlock's life... And Sherlock now knew that he would die to protect the people he cared about. Sherlock knew, and so did Moriarty. He would die shamed and isolated, burned to death. That's what the endgame had always been.

 "You." Sherlock's voice cracked as he spoke the word that meant so much more than its one syllable could convey to Molly... His true, loyal, unyielding friend Molly. Molly whom he'd hurt, Molly whom he had used, manipulated, and belittled. He didn't deserve her friendship or her help. He didn't even understand why she would want to help him, especially if he wasn't what they both believed him to be. And how could she know now if he was or not?

"Tell me what to do." Molly responded resolutely, her eyes glossed over but not quite brimming with tears.

She would never know what she meant to him in this moment. She would never ever know quite how she was saving him... And he loved her. Simply and honestly, without angst or regret other than the hurt he'd repeatedly caused her. He loved her the same way that he now understood he loved John and Mrs Hudson.

He would die for Molly, too, if he had to.

These people were his family, and if this plan didn't work... He would do everything he could to see to their safety.

"I'm asking you to break the law."

"I've broken the law for you before."

Sherlock smiled a small genuine smile for a moment, before gravity took back over.

"There's a body with my face somewhere in England," He started. "Can you track it down for me?"

"How much time do I have?"

"None."

She was silent for a moment.

"Yes, I can track it down."

"And you'll need to falsify records." He paused. "You'll need to declare me dead."

Molly took a sharp intake of breath at that, but nodded.

"Who needs to believe it?"

Sherlock swallowed.

"Everyone."

"Is John--"

"Molly." He interrupted her, looking her in the eyes and hoping that he would not have to voice the sadness that was in them. "Everyone."

"He'll be... Difficult."

Sherlock shook his head.

"I'll convince him."

Molly nodded again, pressing her lips together as a new wave of tears appeared in her eyes.

"You're going to hear some awful things about me." He continued. "Worse than what's already come out."

"I don't care."

"Don't contradict any of it."

She looked startled at that, almost angry.

"What? I--"

"The truth will come out in the end. It always does... But Jim Moriarty has spider webs spinning out in all directions, and the spiders need to believe I've been..."

He stopped at that, and decided to drop that particular point. He was sure she understood, and what's more that the idea was painful to both of them.

"You need to be thorough and convincing." He went on instead. "Can I count on you?"

"Yes." She answered without hesitation.

Of course he could.

Sherlock nodded once, and then made a move to turn around. There was so much to be done, and a very important phone call to be made to Mycroft. This was the last night, he knew. The last night before what, he wasn't certain, but it was an altogether unnerving thought.

"Sherlock..." Molly said suddenly. He turned back to face her completely. She looked nervous and unhappy, even more so than she had a moment before. "Before you-- before _we_... I just..." She paused and took a breath, seemingly trying to get her words straight. Sherlock tilted his head and waited patiently for whatever words were about to come.

"You asked me if I would help you... even if you weren't what I thought you were." She spoke clearly. Sherlock furrowed his forehead. "You have to know, before whatever happens _happens_... that I don't see you as Sherlock Holmes, the famous Consulting Detective. I see... more."  
  
"More?" He couldn't help himself asking.  
  
"There's more to you than... than the cases and the headlines. So whatever they're saying, for whatever it's worth, it wouldn't change what _I_ see."  
  
Sherlock creased his forehead slightly.  
  
"And what do you see?"  
  
Molly seemed hesitant to answer, but in the next moment she answered anyway.  
  
"A good man."

Sherlock wished, suddenly and painfully, that he could be in love with Molly Hooper. She was the kind of woman whose love could make a man's life mean something, even a man like him who couldn't hope to earn it... But good or not, he wasn't _that_ type of man. Molly would move on one day and have the home and family she deserved if she wanted it. He would never want those things, and The Woman who _was_ unfortunate enough to have found herself in the possession of his heart would likely never know any kind of peace from it.

Which was another in his seemingly endless row of crosses to bear now.

Sherlock stepped in close to Molly, looking down at her intently.

"Thank you, Molly Hooper." He said, before leaning down and placing a tender kiss on her lips.

"You don't have to..." She started almost immediately as his lips moved away from hers. "I don't need you to..."

Sherlock took a large step back, and stood to his full height.  
  
"Now then." he said, saving her from whatever turmoil she was about to launch herself in to. "Shall we begin?"  
  
Molly nodded quickly and moved past him back in to the room.

The detective took a deep breath, and then let it out. There was no more time to be sentimental. It was time to get to work.

**...**

 Sherlock stared down at his phone as he sat on the lab floor, his back against the cabinets.

He had drafted several versions of an email to The Woman. A few of them had been explanations as to what was really going on. A few of them had been explanations as to why he was about to die. One of them, just one, had been to tell her that he always missed her, and never more than now when the probability that he would never see her again was higher and heavier than it had ever been before. It had been to tell her that he didn't mean the hurtful words of resentment he'd flung at her in Karachi... That he loved her, and that her willingness to come forward had been worth so much more to him than he could have articulated.

But he'd deleted that draft along with all the rest, and his phone screen had been off for some minutes now.

He didn't know if it was more cowardly to send her a message or to leave her in the dark, but he knew that whatever decision he made it would have to be soon. His fall had already started, and these thoughts he was sparing her now were already too many.

Sherlock pressed his home screen button, but let out a low sound of frustration in the next second as he went to his text message application.

_St bart's. Come now. Urgent._

_SH_

He sent the message to John, and then moved his hips up so that his trouser pocket could accommodate his hand as he put his mobile away. He angrily grabbed the rubber ball that sat next to him on the floor and began to bounce it absently off the cabinet in front of him.

He couldn't think of her. Not now when she was safe and hidden away, and the people closest to him were in real danger. It was a betrayal of the friendships he was willing to die to protect that he was wasting time on this.

He swore that there would be time for her later. He'd make sure she knew what she was to him _later_. After everyone was safe and Moriarty's network had been dismantled... He'd tell her.

Though, even as he let the sound of the bouncing ball begin to block out all thought of Irene Adler, he knew that he was lying to himself.

**...**


	7. Burning

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once again, thank you SO much to anyone who is passing the time by reading this story. I was a little slow coming round to posting this chapter for a few reasons. One is that I wrote about half of it... and then my computer crashed, and I lost the work. GAH! It took a fair bit of pumping myself back up after that to get back to work again. I remembered the skeleton of the chapter, but some of the subtlety was lost, and so I ended up hating the rewrite. Soooo... I took a bit of a break. When I came back to it, I was ready to go. I'm very happy with this installment. 
> 
> Having said that, I've realized something about this story. It turns out that it's ended up being more of a character study than I initially meant it to be, but I don't mind the extra dimension. I know you're here for Irene and Sherlock, and they are my primary focus, but I hope you like the other stuff, too! 
> 
> *Deep breath*... Here we go.

**Come Attrition, Come Hell**

**Chapter 7: Burning  
...**

  
  
Sherlock stared up at the ceiling of his bedroom, his hands clasped over his stomach, the glow from the light in the parlor seeping in to his darkened space from around and underneath his door. 

_Caring is not an advantage... Sherlock._

He frowned as he recalled his brother's words from less than an hour earlier. He had taken the cigarette offered to him and in doing so had failed the test that, really, should have been quite obvious. He'd given in to his odd sense of confusion at the situation, had smoked the quite appreciated cigarette, and it had given him completely away to the older Holmes. He felt rather ridiculous for it now. Especially since John and Mrs. Hudson were very likely on "high alert" for any odd behavior... Which he was sure to exhibit, because once someone was asked to look for something, they were certain to see it. Even if it wasn't there.  
  
And it wasn't.

He didn't have to be told that caring was not an advantage. It didn't even matter that it was, because it had never really factored in to his life or his routine... And when it occasionally did, it did well to make itself known as being decidedly _dis_ advantageous.

He didn't know Irene. And he _didn't_ care.

He was admittedly distracted now, of course. A woman was dead and there were very few clues as to why or how, other than the camera phone that he lay in bed pointedly ignoring for the time being. He knew it would prove more frustrating than helpful at the moment, because he didn't have a clue as to where to begin trying to crack in to it... And that was the kind of vexation that could drive a man to put bullet holes in his wall. 

Besides, who could focus with this damned music playing in his head?

Sherlock looked slightly to the door for a moment and creased his forehead. He could hear the creaking of the floorboards outside, and he knew that someone was coming to speak to him.  
  
There was a knock. He didn't answer.  
  
"Sherlock?" John's somewhat muffled voice came through the wood that separated them.

Sherlock still said nothing.

"Sherlock..." John said again, cracking the door open just a bit.  
  
"What's the point of knocking if you're just going to come in anyway?" Sherlock asked, irritation in his deep voice, not even bothering to turn his head.  
  
John stepped in further, letting all the light from the corridor in. He looked around, sighed, and then put his hands in his pockets.  
  
"Are you okay?" He asked, his head ducked somewhat awkwardly.

"I've answered this question once already tonight, so why don't you save us both the time and irritation and tell me the answer you want to hear?" 

Yes, he was okay. _Of course_ he was okay. Why wouldn't he be okay? So, Irene Adler was dead. It was unexpected; that wasn't to be denied. It was disappointing, certainly. She was fascinating, in her own way, so the world would be a little less clever for her loss. He could admit these things easily. He had respected her. He had even, to some extent, admired her. But had he cared for her? No. She hadn't been a significant part of his life and therefore her loss left no discernible hole in it.  
  
And as his fingers began tapping at the button on his suit jacket, plucking out an unfamiliar concerto that had been repeating in his clouded head all night... He couldn't understand why it left him feeling empty.

"What are you doing?" John gestured toward him, referencing the way he was laid out on the bed.

Sherlock's fingers stilled, and the music in his head stopped. He worked his jaw for a moment, wetting his lips against each other.  
  
"I _was_ trying to sleep."  
  
A beat.  
  
"In your jacket and trousers?"  
  
Sherlock rolled his eyes with an exhale of breath.  
  
"Do you often watch me sleep?"  
  
"No--"  
  
"Then how do you know what I _wear_ to sleep?"  
  
"You index your sock drawer and you wear a silk dressing gown around the flat, and I'm supposed to believe you wear your suit jacket to bed?"

Sherlock frowned tightly.

"Alright," He started. "Don't believe it. Don't believe it all the way back to your arm chair, and later on tonight when you continue to _not_ believe it in your bedroom, you can take notes on how much you've _failed_ to believe it."

Sherlock turned on to his side, facing away from his friend. Somewhere, somewhere - not deep down exactly - but somewhere seemingly outside of himself and far away from this moment and these thoughts, he did understand that John Watson was his only real friend, and that he was only trying to help. Not deep down, but far away from who he was and what he knew he could be, what he _wanted_ to be, he knew that he appreciated it.

He appreciated it, because right now, for reasons unknown and unexplored, he felt--

"I'll leave you alone then." John's resigned voice broke through Sherlock's thoughts after a moment, and the light that spread in to the room began to narrow.

"Yes." Sherlock agreed sharply, but not angrily... and the door clicked shut once again, shrouding him in a darkness that was momentarily deeper than it had been before John had walked in.

 _Yes,_ Sherlock thought as he closed his eyes against a troubling sensation in his chest, the music picking back up where it had left off. 

_Alone._

* * *

 

  **One year Later**

_Alone is what I have. Alone protects me._

He was falling.

Just as Irene had said he would.  
  
Just as James Moriarty had threatened.

In some ways, perhaps, his whole life had led up to this moment. He was headed toward a vastness of solitude he'd never known before, and where just a year and a half before it may not have made a difference to him... it frightened him now. Now when he realized the way he counted on those around him. Now when he really had been able to open up his heart to the people whose hearts had already been open to him for so long. He had been ready, finally...

But _now_ he'd have to forget.

_I'm sorry, John..._

John couldn't be trusted to act the part. He had to believe the fiction. He, above all else, had to grieve. He had to watch his friend plummet to his death, and he had to show the world what it looked like when the only person close to Sherlock Holmes lost him.

_Forgive me. John, please forgive me..._

It was rushing up to meet him. The emptiness. The loneliness. The months or years ahead of him that he'd be forced away from London and Baker Street. His home. His friends. His family.

_As much a part of him as was the color of his eyes..._

The solitary man John Watson met at the lab in St Bart's was gone, and in his place was a man who had just reached his hand out for his friend across an impossible distance before he jumped in to this new world where the unknown awaited him... And he had meant the gesture. He'd meant the tears.

He didn't want to go.

Is this how The Woman had felt?

What was small was now large, and there was no more time.

_Goodbye, John._

_Goodbye, Mr. Holmes._

* * *

  
  
**Six Months Earlier**

_Caring is not an advantage, Sherlock._

Sherlock stared in to his bathroom mirror with almost mad intent, his hands tapping a dissonant and distracted rhythm against the porcelain of the sink. He had started to stare at his reflection while the glass was still fogged by the steam, but it was clear now. His hair had already begun to dry in ringlets around his forehead, and he found that now as he looked in to his own eyes, he didn't recognize the gaze that stared back at him. They were still that irritating color of blue-green that some of the papers liked to go on and on about even when the case they were supposedly reporting was far more interesting. They were still the same shape and size. They were still _his_...  
  
But there was something in them he didn't like or understand, though he didn't try to smooth it away. He stood still, breathing deeply, examining the expression that had taken his face over. His eyelids were raised slightly higher, his mouth was quirked slightly lower, and his lips were pressed slightly closer together.

Sherlock stood up straight, bristling, as it suddenly occurred to him what it was. 

This is what he must have looked like when he was in pain.

He clenched his eyes closed for a moment and shook his head as though to clear it of confusion.

What had he done? He'd allowed himself to succumb to something that had heretofore never even registered on his radar. He had felt a need worse than anything he had experienced in the darkest days of his addicted past, and he had given in to it, mind and body. And more. 

But that was done. He had given himself a moment out of a million more that he would live, and it was spent. There was nothing more to hold on to or to grasp for. Not even an idea. Not even a whisper. He had to let Irene Adler go, which was a ridiculous notion, because he had never had her.  
  
Sherlock squared his shoulders and corrected his posture before walking out of the bathroom and in to his bedroom, buttoning the last of his shirt buttons as he did. Irene sat on the bed with her back facing him. She'd put on the coat that he'd known she'd worn here while he was redressing and staring at himself in the mirror, and she was bent over a bit, probably, he thought, putting her shoes on.  
  
"Are you going to ask me where I'm going?" She asked casually.  
  
"Why would I bother?" Sherlock responded, returning her tone. "You don't have friends, you have people that you have leverage over - none of whom will know you are no longer a threat just yet... So, I'm sure you're likely to find yourself in the company of one of them tonight. Tomorrow I assume you'll be out of London."

Out of London. Sherlock's heart tightened at the mention of it.

Irene stood up and turned to look at him, a cold smile on her face as she clasped the cinch at her waist.   
  
"That is an admirably brave face you're putting on, Mr. Holmes."

"I'm sorry?"

"A clever man once told me that sentiment is a chemical defect found on the losing side." 

He raised his head, preparing himself for whatever the hell The Woman was about to say or do, because he had a distinct feeling that it wasn't going to be very pleasant for him.

"Flattering you think me clever." He spoke the words with an almost suspicious lilt, unsure of what was happening, or why The Woman suddenly seemed like... Well, like The Woman who'd greeted him naked in the entryway of her own parlor.

She laughed shortly.

"I think _you_ think you are."

He angled his face slightly so that he was looking at her almost from the corner of his eyes.

"I know I am. That's the advantage of being clever."

"Yet, for someone who's so intelligent, you really are insultingly easy to manipulate."

He smiled wearily.

"We've played this game before. Sorry to say I'm not interested in playing a second round."

The Woman looked incredulous.

"You really do think I care for you." 

Sherlock let out a short breath of air in something like an ironic laugh at the familiarity of the situation.

"Trying to... Take it back?"

They were her own words thrown back at her for effect, but since he didn't quite know what angle she was taking, he didn't know if they would hit any kind of a mark. Judging by the unperturbed look on her face, they didn't.

"No." She shook her head. "I never gave it to begin with."

He clasped his hands behind his back, though he could hardly stop his fingers from twiddling against each other.

"I'm rather certain that you did." He spoke in the same tone that he had once used to tell a very powerful man that he would have procured the photographs that his employer sought to keep from the public by the end of that day. Had that really only been 6 months ago? It didn't matter.

Sherlock paused before finishing with one word.

"Twice."

"Oh, you mean the sex." Irene responded blithely. Sherlock couldn't keep the surprise from registering in his briefly widened eyes for just the moment that it did. "Well, I'm flattered that it meant so much to you, but sex it just sex, dear... Oh, don't worry. You were much better at it than I would have given you credit for."

That was intended, certainly, to be cruel. He had very few insecurities, and nearly none of them ever came in to play in his life, so having one so callously thrown in his face was unexpected and more than a little unpleasant. This, of course, didn't take in to account at all the fact that his heart was already shattered beyond recognition, and hearing these words from the person who had done it to him was close to torture.

Sherlock lowered his head, his eyes narrowed on Irene as he realized what was happening.

"You're trying to hurt me." It was a statement, not a question. "Interesting."  
  
"Trying?" She asked with a laugh. "You think that I would come to the home of the man who just took everything I worked for away from me out of sentiment? You _guessed_ my password, and that's supposed to prove you're clever? Or that I love you?" She laughed again, though mirthlessly. "My darling, use that big sexy brain of yours and _think_. You were a game. A hobby. A pet. Did it ever occur to you that I set that password because I just thought it was funny?"  
  
Sherlock stared at her blankly, feeling a bit numb at that and, incidentally, more like himself than he had all night.  
  
"And just what have you accomplished tonight then?"  
  
"Isn't it obvious?" She paused, looking at him with wide and mockingly innocent eyes. "I got Sherlock Holmes to _beg_."

He could feel his face falling at that.

_Don't go..._

_Stop..._   
  
_Not yet..._

Her face pulled in to derisive smile.

"Oh," she said. "I do believe you're starting to understand what's happened now."

It didn't take a genius to see what was going on, but since he _was_ a genius, it was as plain as day. Most likely she was putting on something of a show, but not just for him. It would have been for the both of them. There were several clues that lent itself to this conclusion. She was shaking slightly, and trying, desperately it seemed, to control her breathing. She was an accomplished liar, so the usual tells were absent, but then they had been absent before when he had known she was lying to him, too. He could only guess as to why she would be doing this, but it was probably in an effort to distance herself from this strange night. And from him.

But since the damage had already been done, and done thoroughly... He almost felt sorry for her.

Sherlock glanced down for a moment and took a deep breath, then settled his eyes back on Irene who looked so much like she didn't give a damn about him. The interesting thing was that even though he knew it wasn't real, that she was just playing her game, it hurt.

And even as he knew it was a bad idea to further engage her, he could feel himself growing defensive.

"You wanted me to say I loved you." He said coldly. 

Irene's face changed for just a moment at that, a micro-expression that perhaps only Sherlock himself would have noticed.  
  
"It would have been very entertaining."

Sherlock nodded.

"Of course... I _don't_ love you." He continued matter-of-factly, ignoring her comment and beginning to walk around the bed toward her. She watched him silently just as she had watched him in Mycroft's study, looking abruptly on her guard. "But that's what you really want to hear anyway, isn't it? To make it easier on yourself..."

He stood next to her now, staring down in to her widened eyes. He gave her a smile that was more of a grimace as he shook his head only once.

"Because if I said I loved you, how could you possibly walk out of here?"

She stared wordlessly at him for a moment.

"I feel sorry for you." She whispered.  
  
"Don't." He responded almost as quietly, and then continued on normally. "It's not me you have to worry about."  
  
"No?"

He pouted a bit in a shrug.

"No," He started. "I'm disappointed, really. You're failing to see what's right in front of you."

"And what is that?"

"That I've known from the outset of this encounter that you would be leaving at the end of it... And what you should ask yourself is, if I really wanted, could I convince you to stay?"

She was silent.

"Because I believe I could." He closed the small distance between them, running the backs of his fingers over her hand and hovering his lips very near to hers, though she seemed too mesmerized to notice. "If I really was begging, then I'd say those words you're terrified of hearing. I'd try to... Persuade you."

"What makes you think--"

"I can be very convincing when I want to be."

The haze lifted from her face at that, and her eyes were sharp once again. She stepped back from him.

"Goodbye, Mr. Holmes." She said, and her voice was a rasp of both resolve and uncertainty. She walked past him, and he didn't turn to watch her.

He couldn't watch her go.

He could hear the knob turn, and the door open... And with those two sounds he could feel almost a life's worth of love and desire amount to absolutely nothing. It was gutting, and he had never felt more alone.

"I couldn't have let you stay in possession of the information on that phone." He said suddenly, though quite calmly. Then with a deep breath, he did turn to look at her. Her eyes were on him, and her hand was on the knob of the open door. She looked surprised and, he thought, a little bit angry... but what he had just said was not meant to put either of those expressions on her face. It was just, plain and simply, the truth. "You _must_ know that...?"  
  
Irene's face didn't change, and so she must not have.

"Moriarty exploited that information once, and it would only have been a matter of time before he needed or wanted to do it again. No one was safe as long as you were in possession of the phone." He shook his head slightly. "Not even you."

"I would have been fine." She bit out.

He shook his head again, this time with an almost pitying smile on his lips.  
  
"A child with a box of matches doesn't know the damage he can do until the damage has already been done."

Her faced transitioned from angry to visibly hurt, and Sherlock dropped his gaze to his bed before returning it to the wall before him.

"Goodbye, Ms. Adler."

There was a moment of ringing silence, and then he heard the door close.

She was gone.

For several moments, Sherlock stared at the wall before him, feeling the room beginning to spin and the breath beginning to leave his body. He felt, quite irrationally, that if he didn't move, he wouldn't have to feel the pain that he could sense welling up behind an emotional dam that was crumbling inside his body. Cold panic was settling like a fog around him, and he had to blink rapidly to keep his eyes clear.

He turned to look at the spot where Irene had just stood, and when he was confronted with the empty room his left knee gave out just slightly, but enough to alter his stance a bit. He tented his hands against his face, his nose resting on the tips of his fingers, before running them down his chin, and then through his hair.

It was almost as though she had never been here.

Sherlock shook his head at the thought. No, she _had_ been here. She had _just_ been here. The sheets of his bed were still rumpled and in disarray. The steam from the shower still moistened the air. She'd left visible and physical traces of her presence. She _had_ been here.

 _They_ had been here.

Sherlock took a deep breath, and was dismayed to find that it was shaking. There was a burning in his chest and a stinging in his eyes, and he believed that every second the distress he felt was as bad as it was going to get only to be proven wrong when it grew worse in the next.

Quickly, countless varying thoughts ran through Sherlock's mind, but one thread in particular rose well above the rest.

_You shouldn't have let her go/I had to let her go/I ruined her life/She ruined my life/Oh God/OH GOD/I loved her/I love her/I LOVE HER/Tell her/Coward/Tell her/One chance/Go after her/ONE CHANCE/ TELL HER--_

Sherlock growled, frustrated, and strode suddenly toward his bedroom door. He pulled it open and hurried through it and down the corridor. His feet carried him quickly down the 17 steps and to the foyer door, through it, through the front door, and on to the cold London walkway.

The ground was wet, and moisture hung heavy in the air as Sherlock quickly turned one way, and then the other.

Irene Adler was nowhere to be seen.

No, no _, no_ . He had to tell her. If he didn't tell her now, _right_ now, she'd never know it. And why not _let_ her know it? It would do just as much harm to tell her he loved her as it would not to, so why not just rid himself of the words? He would never have another chance, he would never feel this way again, and the thought that he would have to bear the weight of the unsaid words and the unlived moments was crushing. He couldn't. His life wouldn't allow for it. She had to know. She had to know, or he feared it would take the rest of his life trying to forget it himself.

But she really was gone. 

Irene Adler, in the end, had been the more intelligent of the two of them. She'd been cruel to him in those last moments to hurt his pride, to keep him from being able to bring himself to admit any sentiment that he did happen to feel. It had worked, and it had worked very well. He'd been somewhat cruel in return and had made it easy for her to leave him... and she had done quickly, and seemingly without looking back.   
  
He had been... insultingly easy to manipulate.  
  
The part that she couldn't have known was how he really felt toward her, and so all she _could_ do was be cruel. That fault was his. That was the kind of man he was.

He'd lost her.

No, he hadn't lost her. He had first given her up, and then had pushed her away. There may have been a time that he actually could have helped her, but he had been too blinded to see what was really going on. He'd let her drown right in front of him, and then when all she had to hold on to was the perceived promise of safety, he'd pulled it away from her flailing hands and watched her go under with vindictive intent.

_Love is a more vicious motivator..._

Yes, that was the kind of man he was... She couldn't have shown him kindness in the end. It wouldn't have fit.

Sherlock put one hand on his hip and pressed his lips together as he scanned the street one more time.

_The promise of love, the pain of loss..._

He screwed his eyes shut against his brother's words.

Did he want her? Yes.

He opened his eyes, hardened his face, and breathed in.  
  
Did he _have_ her? No.  
  
Sherlock turned around, and walked slowly up to the front door of 221B. He stared at the open door recalling how he'd come here earlier tonight and how he'd been comforted by the sight of home. She'd taken that from him. She'd taken a lot from him tonight.

But would it change matters at all to grieve the loss? No.

Sherlock pushed through the front door slowly, then through the foyer door. He walked to the staircase and put his bare foot on the first step.  
  
Was he in pain? Yes.  
  
Second step.  
  
Could he control it?

Third step.

Yes.

Fourth step.

Did he love her? 

Fifth step.  
  
Did he _love_ her?  
  
Sixth step.

 _Caring is not an advantage._  
  
Seventh step.

_Sherlock._

Eighth step.

_I'm not a psychopath; I'm a high functioning sociopath. Do your research._

Ninth step.

_The name is Sherlock Holmes, and the address is 221B Baker Street..._

Tenth step. Sherlock rounded the landing.

_I've always assumed love is a dangerous disadvantage..._

Eleventh step.

Did he love her?

Twelfth step.

_Goodbye, Mr. Holmes._

Thirteenth step.

Was he in pain?

Fourteenth step.

No.

Fifteenth step.

Did he _love_ her?

Sixteenth step.  
  
No.  
  
Seventeenth step.  
  
 _Goodbye, Ms. Adler._

Sherlock walked slowly though the door in to his flat, his heart shuttering up and the pain in his chest subsiding. It had all been a drama, a play, an act. Nothing said and nothing done tonight had meant anything at all, and he could appreciate the diversion and the deviation. The distraction.

The game.  
  
Sherlock avoided looking out from his window as he made his way to his violin that was perched in the corner. Taking the instrument and bow in his hand, he positioned himself to play.  
  
The haunting melody, The Woman's melody, spilled in to the air and began filling in all the holes in the flat, sinking in through the slats in the wooden floor, sinking in to the fabric draped over John's chair, being reflected back in to the open space by the mirror... absorbing through Sherlock's clothes and skin, stoppering up the parts of him that still bled and burned.

This was the end, and this piece of music, played for the last time, would end it.

Sherlock closed his eyes and let his remaining hurt and emptiness fade away with the dying notes, one after the other.

He played until there was nothing. He played until the tune meant nothing to him.

Sherlock opened his eyes, the music ceasing abruptly.

"Had a call from Mycroft." John's voice came from behind him. He didn't turn to look at his friend.

"I don't doubt it." Sherlock responded, replacing his violin to its usual spot.

"Would there be any point in asking if you're all right?"  
  
Sherlock smiled slightly and turned around.  
  
"A pun." He said with his smile turning to a sneer of dissatisfaction, and then sighed with a roll of his eyes. "Dull."

John creased his forehead.

"You sound disappointed."

"I was expecting..." He paused. "Better."

John nodded and stepped in to the room from the doorway.

"So... she's gone then?" He seemed to think he had to tread the subject lightly. "For good?"

Sherlock faced his back to John once again, and walked over to the window. He pulled back the curtains and looked down on the empty street below. There was a numbness in him where earlier there was a fire, and an emptiness where earlier there was a woman. The Woman. That was the answer to John's question.

_I won't last six months..._

"Yes." Sherlock said. "For good."

* * *

**Two Months Later**

Sherlock's heart beat faster than it ever had before in his life, and he was almost certain that the people around him could hear it. The adrenaline that coursed through his body was euphoric and nearly overwhelming, and he had almost no presence of mind left over to alert him to the fact that he was frightened. 

He approached the figure in black that kneeled before him, his weapon drawn.

The Woman's sound of ecstasy, still Sherlock's text alert tone, filled the air suddenly, and Irene Adler looked abruptly up at him, her tear filled eyes wide.

"When I say run," He whispered at her, his eyes widening. " _Run_ ."  


**END PART 1**

**...**


	8. Part 2: Find Me

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi again!
> 
> So, I took a short break to write the first chapter of a much, shall we say, _fluffier_ fic… but my mind seems to want to be here instead, so… well. Here I am. :)
> 
> There is a scene in this chapter that I've had written since I started writing "Come Attrition", and I'm very excited to finally put it out there. I hope that you are just as excited to read it!
> 
> Thank you again to everyone who is following this story. You guys are wonderful!

  
**Come Attrition, Come Hell  
Part 2**

**Chapter 8: Find Me**

**…**

Mycroft stared at his brother silently from across his desk, his lips pursed and his forehead furrowed, as he seemed to contemplate the words the two of them had just spoken to one another. He looked, Sherlock thought, fairly reluctant and just a bit worried.

"You do realize what this would mean for you then?" He asked finally, the grave tone of his voice heavy with concern.  
  
Sherlock stared unwaveringly into his brother's eyes and nodded once.

"He will tie your reputation to his chariot and drag it through the rubble."

Sherlock let a moment pass silently, but there was no weakness in his resolve.

"Yes." He agreed.

Mycroft took a deep breath, and then with obvious effort smoothed his expression in to a look of passivity as he sat up.

"I'll make some phone calls."

"I assume you know where he is?"  
  
Mycroft smiled.  
  
"Of course I know where he is." He responded. "He's in near constant contact. The truth is that he's always kept his hands relatively clean in his dealings, so bringing him in on any charge has remained pointless."

"Well, there's a point now." Sherlock spoke the words in an almost irreverent way, and then stood. "I'll leave you to it."

**...**

Sherlock Holmes walked out from his brother's posh home and on to the day-lit walkway.

Stopping for a moment, he looked up at the sky with just his eyes - a break in the gray just ahead him giving way to blue. He wondered what other skies in other cities looked like just now. He wondered what the air felt like across the world. Hot and humid? Cold and crisp? Violent? Air could be violent.

Anything could be violent.

He started walking.

There was a lot to think of now, and a daunting amount of work to be done.

And then there was The Woman.

Irene Adler was one of two things at the moment, alive or dead... And though dead was not the preferred possibility, alive made things harder. He would have to help her on his own with no help from John or Mycroft, because with all the other entanglements of his now extremely precarious situation - any help from them would put them in danger.

Sherlock absently hailed a cab.

"221 Baker Street." He said as he climbed in to the vehicle.

He rested his cheek slightly against his twitching fingers and looked out from the window at the blurred buildings as they passed. Now that he was alone and actually could afford it, he allowed his thoughts to turn completely toward the only puzzle in his life he had ever wanted to write out of his memory.

He couldn't deny that he'd spent the better part of this last month forcibly asserting an idea of The Woman in his own mind that was in no way congruent with the way he felt about her on the occasion of their last meeting, and that the unpleasant tightening of his chest when he thought about her in danger was proof that he'd failed somewhat in that endeavor. He'd tried to bury his sentiment for her deep within the center of himself, and at the first sign that she needed his help it had rushed securely back to the forefront of his emotional awareness.

He took a deep breath.

 _Of course... I_ don't _love you._

The last words he'd spoken to her had been cold, and he found that when he thought about it now it made him... what was the word?

Sad.

She had forced out of him a depth of feeling that he had never experienced before, and when she left he'd pushed it all away. Now there was no longer a burning fire in the hearth in her room in his mind palace, but rather a flickering candle... a candle that, if it tipped, threatened to engulf the room in flames. And him. It was best if he didn't allow that to happen. It was best if he kept his thoughts about her as sterile and clinical as though he were examining a body in a morgue.

Which, of course, was a terrible line of thought, because he had seen her lying dead in a morgue before... or at least, he had believed that it had been her at the time, and the memory was among one of the most painful he possessed. Especially now when it was very possible that The Woman was--

He clenched his eyes shut.

_Find me..._

* * *

**3 Years Later**

Sherlock opened his eyes slowly, a drug and pain induced haze settled securely around his consciousness. Dim dawn light filtered in through the blinds of the hospital room window, and as his pupils slowly adjusted to the dark a figure began to come in to focus. **  
**

And there she was, sitting at the foot of his bed.

It was odd. Sherlock had hallucinated or imagined this exact thing happening so many times, that he was surprised he knew for a fact that she was real. He didn't even really stop to wonder what she was doing back in London, because of course she had heard the news that The Great Sherlock Holmes had been shot and hospitalized... and _of course_ she had risked coming here to see him.

Of course she'd come to say goodbye. It was the only thing they ever said to one another.

"I know why you never contacted me." Irene Adler said quietly. Sadly.

Sherlock felt heavy and cold, and it had much less to do with the literal hole in his chest as it did with the figurative one.

"I'm sorry." He said, and his voice was hoarse. It sounded as though he had not used it in years, which was fitting. She hadn't heard it in that amount of time.

As the light from outside grew brighter, Irene came more in to view. Her hair sat around her shoulders in soft curls, and there seemed to be a glow about her that befit what she had become to him over the years he'd known her. The years he'd loved her. She was so breathtakingly stunning and he was so breathtakingly overwhelmed with everything that had happened in the last two days that he could not pretend, even with himself, that this was not the woman who he'd have spent his life with if his life had offered him that.

The Woman shook her head slightly, a small smile on her face.

"No." She responded, but there was no anger or malice in the word. "You could have a thousand chances to do it differently, and you'd do it exactly the same a thousand times."

Sherlock returned the smile, though he was finding it particularly difficult to breathe.

"I _have_ missed you." Sherlock admitted, though perhaps he wouldn't have if he hadn't been hooked directly in to a line of morphine.

"I believe you."

Sherlock tried to move his hand to reach for her, but was rewarded with a stabbing pain shooting through the whole of his torso and down his arms. He flinched suddenly, gritting his teeth.

Which was also fitting, because hadn't she always been just out of reach?

Her hand was caressing his face soothingly, and then running through his hair as he waded through the pain that was subsiding far too slowly for his liking, and the touch of her hands felt abstract and far away. He wanted to reach up and take them within his, but moving was torture.

It was a few moments before he realized she was whispering something to him, and then a few more before he realized she was only muttering shushing noises because he had been groaning in pain.

"Shhhh..." Her voice was so lovely and encompassing. "Shhh... It’ll pass. It's not so bad."

Sherlock suddenly felt a rush of warmth, and noted vaguely that The Woman had just pressed the button on his morphine tap.

"Don't go." Sherlock heard his own voice ask pleadingly for the second time in his life, but it felt as though it were coming from outside of him.

"I can't stay." She gave the familiar answer. "I only came to ask that you please stop dying. Once was enough."

Sherlock looked up in to the face of The Woman and wanted almost desperately to tell her that he loved her and that he had been afraid for all those years that what he felt for her would destroy him and eventually _them_ , and _that_ had been why he never contacted her. It hadn't been because he didn't want her, but it had been, in fact, exactly the opposite.

But he couldn't. There was the problem of Mary Watson now, and there was no room for telling Irene Adler that she was the love of his... well, "life" seemed so trite. She was more than that, more than a figure in his life. She was the sun, and he felt he orbited around her even when she was a million miles away. He felt the warmth of her few embraces in his sleep, and the pull toward her was constant. No, there was no room for telling her that she was everything he ever imagined could be awful and wonderful about love.

It was apparent to him that there would never be room for it.

"Don't say goodbye." He whispered, closing his eyes.

He felt her lips against his, and a gentle hand against his cheek. She was leaving him again, and there was nothing he could do to stop it... and the hurt that resonated throughout his entire being was somehow much worse than the wound beneath his heart.

"Goodnight, Mr. Sherlock Holmes." She whispered in to his ear, and then the bed shifted.  
  
A few moments later, Sherlock opened his eyes to an empty room - a card with a W on it and a single rose sitting perched by the window.

Years before, when confronted with an empty room that The Woman had occupied mere seconds before, he had rushed out to declare his feelings for her. Now, with exhaustion and physical pain washing over him in heavy waves, he couldn't even lift his head to look toward the door she'd just gone through.

A warm tear rolled down the side of Sherlock's face as he closed his eyes again, allowing the morphine to begin fooling him in to thinking everything was just fine.

_Shhh... It's not so bad._

* * *

 

**2 Years, 11 Months Earlier**

Irene woke with a start, a barely suppressed groan seemingly stifled in the back of her throat, leaving her breathing ragged and uneven. She swallowed and took one, then two steadying breaths before she appeared to calm herself. She pushed herself up slowly in the small bed and narrowed her eyes as they began to scan the dark room.

Sherlock Holmes sat silently observing her, his fingers pitched beneath his chin, at the writing desk in the corner just to the left of the window, though his body was turned toward the bed.

"Nightmare." He said in a cool, even voice. It was a statement, not a question.

Irene jumped a bit.

"I..." She furrowed her forehead and squeezed her eyes shut for just a moment, but by the time she opened them again, Sherlock's face was no longer balanced over his fingers, and he was leaning forward. "How do you know?" 

"I don't. I'm _assuming_." He answered honestly.  "You woke up startled; that I could tell from the sudden and sharp breath of air you took. Your heart is probably racing; I can't know that, but since I still assume I'm correct, I'm sure you've already confirmed it to yourself."

"No, I..." She swallowed, obviously not sure of what to say.

 Sherlock watched her intently, knowing that she had been through quite a lot in a relatively short amount of time, and unsure himself about how to proceed. He thought it best, for now, to let her control the conversation.

"What time is it?" She finished.

"Quarter to 2 in the morning." He answered her.  "You've been asleep for 3 hours."

A small incredulous smile quirked up the side of her lips.

"Have you been watching me sleep the entire time?" She asked. He didn't answer. "Should I be flattered?"

"No."

"Of course not." She said with a short, almost indiscernible laugh, though, Sherlock thought, there was very little to laugh about considering the situation.

"You've had a recent and traumatic blow to the head," He began, maintaining his even tone, wary of giving her the impression that he was here for any other reason then that she had needed his help. "And I was hesitant to let you sleep at all lest you fall in to a very inconvenient coma... but I could see that you were in rather urgent need of it. So, yes, I was watching the entire time."

 "I see." She said quietly, and then paused, any semblance of a smile or mirth dying away from her face. "You saved my life."

"Yes."  He answered plainly, and he was glad that the darkness more than likely concealed his face from her.

"Why?"

"Would you have preferred me to let you die?" He asked bluntly.

"No, but why?"

"Why does anyone do anything?"

He knew it was an interesting question coming from him, because from anyone else it may have just been deflection with a million correct answers... But this time, there was only one. The reason _behind_ the motivation.

"Because they can." Irene responded, quite correctly.

 Sherlock raised his head a bit, a bit of a forced smile spreading across his face. It wasn't the whole truth, of course… but then, when was it ever?

"And, as it turns out..." He started, allowing an arrogant lilt to come across in his voice. "I could."

Sherlock flicked the desk lamp next to him on with that, and after a brief few moments of adjusting to the light, he found himself staring really and truly face to face with Irene Adler for the first time since he had told her to run...

When he'd caught up to her minutes later and grabbed her wrist from behind her, she'd screamed once, but he managed to quiet her with a hand to her mouth, and pulled the two of them even farther in to the dark that seemed to swallow them both whole.

"Don't." Was all Sherlock had whispered harshly in her ear, holding her firmly to him. The flood of relief that she was safe was nearly enough to take his breath away, though it was clear from the blood on her head and hands that she had taken a spill in the short time they had been apart. His heart ached briefly for any pain she had endured before he shut the emotion out completely. He had completed the mission. She was alive, and out of immediate harm's way.

Sherlock had had a car waiting for them on the side of the road, and they had driven in dark silence for quite a while before reaching the fairly modern hotel. Though,  due quite likely to a combination of fatigue and pain, she had needed to be half carried to the room. He hadn't said a word to her, even as he laid her down on the bed... Even as he cleaned the blood from her forehead as she slept. Even as he gently ran a finger down her cheek.

Now, as though she could read his thoughts, Irene's own fingers went to the tender wound below her hairline.

"You never lost consciousness, so it's unlikely to be a concussion." Sherlock said, surveying the injury that she was touching. He no longer wore the black executioner's garb, as he had felt that Irene would have been quite unhappy to be greeted with that when she awoke, and was now simply dressed in a black shirt open at the collar, and black trousers. He had taken a bit of a beating himself, so he couldn't blame her for the intent way she surveyed his own wounds.

"Still," he continued. "I'll arrange to have it looked at before we depart."

Irene dropped her hand down to her lap, and looked him in the eyes.

"Depart for where?" She asked. "London?"

Sherlock kept his face relatively blank, though he knit his eyebrows together for just a moment, as though in confusion. 

"Maybe it _is_ a concussion." Was his response as he narrowly avoided a stab of sympathy for her over the fact that the first place she mentioned was London.  
  
Of course she wasn't going back to London. She wouldn't be in Karachi in the first place if London had been a viable option. It was very possible she would never see London again... And at _that_ thought, he did feel quite sorry for her.  
  
"Then where?" She asked, tearing the sheet off of her and throwing her legs over the side of the bed so that she was now seated directly across from Sherlock, separated only by air and soft carpet.

Sherlock eyed her with an intense gaze that she didn't seem comfortable under.

"Where would you like to go?"

"Home." She answered without hesitation.

Sherlock ignored the throb in his heart, and managed to look almost disappointed.

"Yes, but we've already established that as an impossibility," he started impatiently. "So I ask you again - where would you like to go?"  
  
Irene swallowed.  
  
"America."

"Stop it." He chided, and Irene visibly flinched at the admonishment. "You'd be recognized in America almost as quickly as in London, and I've gone through quite a bit of trouble to get you out of this mess you've so artfully crafted for yourself."

"It's clear you already have a destination in mind. Why give me a choice?"

He shook his head as if to say, _"No, no,_ no _...",_ even as his betraying instincts were directing him to do things he knew he couldn't do. 

"I didn't give you a choice, I asked you a _question_..." He paused, burning his gaze in to hers. "Now, why would _I_ do that?"  
  
There was a long silence in the room as Irene stared back at him, her eyes slowly becoming sharp as realization poured over her face. Sherlock felt an odd sense of pride swell for her in that moment, because, of course, he knew she would understand him.

"To get answers." She said.

Sherlock felt his face smooth at this.

"And what does wanting to go home, or if not home then to America, tell me about you?"   
  
"That I want something familiar."

He nodded shortly.

"Why?"  
  
Her breath audibly caught in her chest, and her pulse leapt in her throat. She looked suddenly hesitant - scared.  
  
" _Why_?" He pressed, leaning even more forward, balancing his weight on his forearms so that his face was very near hers, his eyes studying her carefully.

"Because..." She faltered for a moment, but she must have known he'd already seen it. Didn't she know he could read it off her like lines off of a page, and that he'd been aware from the moment she'd woken up with a catch in her breath?

"Irene," Sherlock said gently, allowing himself that. She looked in to his eyes.  "Tell me why."

He'd destroyed her life with 4 letters, but still the next words to come out of her mouth hurt more than anything they'd said to each other the last time they'd met - even though he'd been expecting it...

"Because I'm afraid."  
  
And with that, Sherlock's slumped as though he had been holding his breath. He knew he couldn't get her to admit that if he had just asked point blank; he had to have her follow a line of questioning to its logical conclusion so that she could admit aloud what she had already admitted to herself.  
  
"And why did I need you to admit that? Now. Not in an hour, not tomorrow... Now."

Why did he want her to admit her fear now? For the same reason a drug addict needed to admit they had a problem sooner rather than later. A fitting analogy, he thought.

"Because if I can admit it aloud, and to you... then it can't control me."

Sherlock sat back, resuming his initial pose with his fingers underneath his chin.

"Now." He said again, and paused, then each word in his next question was said with deliberate emphasis. "Where. Would you like. To go?" 

Irene took a deep breath.  
  
"Where no one will look."

Sherlock smiled genuinely, recalling the day he'd said those exact words to John Watson when he had asked where Irene's camera phone was hidden.

"Excellent." He said as he reached behind him in to his coat that hanged over his chair. "I'm glad we are in agreement."

He produced an envelope, and handed it to Irene. Her brows came together as she opened it up to reveal several articles of identification, all with her face but not with her name, and a boarding pass that would tell her she'd be on her way to a new life by noon the next day.

"Well," she said, looking down at the words in front of her. "They'll never look there."

She looked up in to Sherlock's eyes. He swallowed, and reminded himself that in less than 12 hours she'd be out of his life again, probably - no, _hopefully_ \- for good, and that he couldn't risk getting any more involved than he already was. Moriarty was in custody now, and time was growing short.   
  
"Why?" It was her turn to ask now apparently, her eyes wide.

He furrowed his forehead.

"What do you mean, 'why'?"  He sat up in his chair, feeling very uncomfortable with the look in her eyes. "Stop looking at me like that."  
  
"Like what?"  
  
"Like you think you've just garnered some deep insight to the inner workings of my soul."

"I've yet to find evidence of a soul, Mr. Holmes, but you can be sure you will be the first one to know if I do."

For some reason, a reason certainly better left unexamined, that offended him.

"In me, or at all?" He asked darkly. "Either way, I'd advise against holding your breath."

Irene stood up from the bed, dropping the documents to the floor, and then kneeled fluidly in front of Sherlock, staring up in to his eyes. He sat back in his chair as far as he could, pushing away the memory of when she had done this before in his flat. He didn't trust her then, and he didn't trust himself now. 

"What are you doing?" He asked quietly, almost unable to cope with her sudden close proximity.

"Why are you still here?" She asked, and he was surprised to find that her voice was tinged with something that sounded like awe. "With the rescue done, you could have set me loose on the world without a backward glance."

Sherlock narrowed his eyes.

"That didn't work out so well for you last time, if I recall." He held his hands out and gestured loftily at their surroundings.   
  
Irene moved slightly as though he had just shocked her, and then fell back on to her shins, giving the impression of a woman who had just had the air knocked out of her.

Sherlock regretted his words, and regretted even more referring to that night aloud. He had resolved not to bring it up, to pretend none of it had ever happened... but it wouldn't be such an easy task if he was just going to throw it in her face like that.

 "You let me leave to die." Irene said, her face hard. "So why did you come back for me?"

 Sherlock swallowed, still boring his eyes in to hers, his teeth clenching behind his lips.

 "You told me to find you." He responded. "So I did."

 Whatever she had been expecting his answer to be, she did not appear to be expecting that.

"Why?"

Sherlock felt a deep frustration pooling in the pit of his stomach.  
  
"Why, _what_?"

"I have a ticket on the floor next to me that says tonight is probably the last I will ever see of Sherlock Holmes, and I want to know _why_."  
  
Why. She wanted to know _why_.  
  
He could tell her. He could unload months of repressed loathing, and hatred, and aching, and longing on her this moment if he was so inclined. He could explain to her that she had broken his heart even though he had always believed that there was very little heart to break, that he had hidden his feelings for her in a locked room in his mind once it was clear that she really was _gone_... But even so, with all that, he had always known deep down that he couldn't _bear_ a world where The Woman was dead. So much so that even in the middle of the most dangerous case he had ever been involved in, he had tracked her across _continents_ to make sure that she was okay.

He wanted to not care and to remain above it all; he wanted to be above this ridiculous sentiment that had ultimately been even Irene Adler's downfall, but in the end he knew he absolutely wasn't. Once he'd tracked her capture in Karachi, he'd had very little time to make the proper arrangements. As it was, their current situation was shaky at best, and would remain so until she was out of this country. He'd have some cleaning up to do within the days to come, but that was the easy part. 

The hard part was behind him, but the still hardest part was seated on the floor in front of him.

Then she reached up and put her hand over his, just as she had on that night that now seemed almost a lifetime away. Sherlock was jolted out of his introspection as though she had slapped him, and he pulled suddenly away from her touch.

"No," he said, standing up and walking past her to the other side of the room. She turned to look at him, but didn't move from her position on the floor. The surprised look of hurt in her eyes bothered Sherlock more than he cared to analyze. He buttoned his shirt at the collar. "You should sleep if you can."  
  
"Sherlock--"  
  
No, he couldn't listen to what she was going to say. He didn't want to hear _anything_ she had to say. She was cunning and manipulative, and he had found himself drowning in his feelings for her once before... but he wouldn't allow it again. He'd saved her life, because he could not possibly have done anything contrary, but he _abhorred_ her.

Then, as it had transpired, he realized he had said all of this, more or less, aloud.

Irene stared in stunned silence, more than likely shocked at the emotional confession. Sherlock himself was shocked by it in any case, so there was no reason why she shouldn't have been.

"Why?" She asked again, standing slowly to her feet, her sharp and penetrating gaze fixed on him, and he could feel himself begin to unravel from the inside out, just as though she were tugging at a loose strand of his atomic makeup. "Why are you here if you loathe me so much?"

"This is redic--"  
  
"Why?" She pressed, taking a step toward him.

 It was then that he finally locked his eyes back on to hers, and she stopped. Somewhere along the way his heart had begun to pound almost painfully, and a weight of crushing intensity had settled in his chest. It was clear, the answer she wanted. What's more, was that the answer she wanted was nothing more than the truth. 

The room around Sherlock disappeared, as it sometimes did, and he was suddenly back in 221B Baker Street, a soft fire burning in the fireplace that he stared down at it. He turned suddenly to see The Woman standing naked before him, her hair perfectly pinned up, just as she had upon their first meeting. She smiled at him mockingly.  
  
"Why can't I make you leave?" He asked angrily, his voice unsteady, his eyes irritatingly wet. He circled around her, surveying her form, but not so much for its features as for its clues.  
  
"Because you like me here." She answered, even though she very rarely answered, following his revolution with just the slight turns of her head.  
  
"It's true, Sherlock." Came John Watson's voice from the kitchen. Sherlock turned suddenly in its direction only to see his friend staring at him from over a cup of tea at the table.  John stared at him with his familiar irritated-yet-patient expression. "You know it's true, or else you wouldn't even bother."

"I didn't ask you." Sherlock ground out from behind clenched teeth.

"No, of course you didn't ask me. You never ask me, but I am _telling_ you."  
  
"Telling me what?" He exclaimed in frustration. "You aren't telling me anything!"  
  
"Figure it out, Sherlock!" The shorter man said as he rounded the kitchen table, coming to stand in the archway. "You're so good at reading other people, but you never think to turn the magnifying glass back in on yourself."

Sherlock's eyebrows furrowed furiously.

"What are you talking about?" He asked, and then turned toward the naked Woman. "What is he talking ab..." But the question died on his lips when he found that she was no longer naked, but wearing his blue dressing gown, her hair falling messily around her shoulders, and his heart ached.  
  
"You..." He breathed, as she reached out to take his hand. More troubling than that: he found himself reaching back out for hers.

The Woman in his dressing gown disappeared along with his Baker Street flat, and he was very suddenly staring at the real Irene Adler, who was now standing just an arm's length away, looking at him as though he was the only person in the world. To his surprise and infinite humiliation, he was almost touching her, as his arm was still raised to touch her hand. He dropped it as soon as he realized, and cleared his throat.

The Schrödinger equation. That was always a good one; one that people almost always misunderstood. The cat was not both dead and alive, because once you opened that box, he was only ever going to one of those things. The paradox only served to highlight the fact that proposing that atoms could exist in every state all at once was absurd, because it would be like saying a cat could be dead and not dead at the same time. People never understood that it was always an exercise in thought, and not a practical application of theory.

Really, though, none of that mattered. It didn't even matter now as he ran the numbers and Greek letters of the equation through his head. It was only a distraction. Something to keep his mind occupied when there was nothing else in the room but her.

"The cat's dead." He blurted out, and then realized he did so, and closed his eyes tightly at the idiocy.

"Sherlock." He opened his eyes again to find her just in front of him, and with his hand in both of hers. He looked down at it, and then over to his left where Baker Street now seemed to blend in to his current surroundings. Mind Palace Irene and John stared at him expectantly, but his gaze only hit upon her. With his heart skipping a beat, and a general pain settling around his chest and eyes, he realized what it was John wanted him to admit aloud.

"Love..." He whispered, and then the apparitions were gone. He turned his gaze back to a stricken looking Irene Adler.

"What?" She asked with a small voice. Sherlock bit down and jerked his hand away from her; jerked his whole body away from her to face the far wall. He ran his shaking hand through his hair and then laughed mirthlessly at himself, or at her. 

"No good deed goes unpunished." He said, looking back to her with wide and angry eyes.

"I don't understand." She said, watching him. 

It was definitely the truth. How could she understand? He certainly didn't.

"You." He said after a moment. "My _good_ deed."

"Me?" She asked with a tilt of her head.

"Yes." He said with impatient anger. "You. Your rescue. Coming here at all. Thinking that I could pop in and out like a cigarette run to Tesco's."

Irene looked offended that he would talk about her that way, and in truth it was sort of absurd. This woman had nearly had the whole of Britain underneath her red shoe heel, and he spoke of her now as though she were some sort of inconvenient errand. Which was so far from the truth that it was laughable.

"And you think you're being punished for it?"

His lips pressed together in a very brief grin that didn't even reach his cheeks.

"Aren't I?"

Irene bit down and hardened her face.

"You wanted me to admit that I'm afraid, but I think you're more afraid than I am."  
  
Sherlock's expression turned dark as he cocked his head a bit, hating everything about his life at the moment. He hated himself for all the stupidity of allowing this conversation to start let alone continue. He hated Irene for all the same reasons he always hated her, and he hated that every time he saw her he was being forced to let her go.

 _Ugh, no!_ He reprimanded himself. _I_ want _to let her go..._

"Afraid?" he asked, then stalked toward her in one slow step.

 Irene stood her ground, though it clearly surprised her when Sherlock took her hand and pressed it hard against his chest. She looked sharply up in to his narrowed eyes. His jaw was set, his cheeks were hot... and his heart was pounding. 

"I'm terrified." He finished.

And then, as though no time had passed between the worst night of Sherlock's life and now, Irene Adler kissed him.

**...**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you want to know what really happened in Karachi, I suggest you head over to "Neither A Soldier, Nor A Gentleman" by Francesca_Wayland if you haven't already. I read the story during my little break, and it's a much better depiction. The story is absolutely flawless!


	9. The Truth Is

**Come Attrition, Come Hell  
Chapter 9: The Truth Is**

**...**

  
  
  
_Irene,_

_The last time I was presented with the inescapable necessity of disappearing for a long while, I didn't explain the situation to you. Looking back now, I believe it was because I didn't feel that I owed you an explanation. I also wasn't certain you would want one. I didn't want to know that you wouldn't._

Sherlock stared at the bright screen of the computer and sat back away from it, taking a deep shaking breath as he did so. He'd been nervous before. He'd been frightened. He'd even been sad... But he'd never been a combination of all three at once, and certainly never to this level or degree. For the first time in his life, he didn't know what was going to happen. There was no clear plan or path ahead of him. The future appeared before him as a great yawning chasm of fog and uncertainty... and he no longer had it in him to pretend that it didn't matter.

With slightly trembling hands, he returned his fingers to the keyboard.

_This time, however, I realise that I've always owed you an explanation. And while it comes late, too late, it is my hope that it offers you the insight you deserve._

* * *

**  
10 Months Earlier**

Sherlock Holmes stared his best friend in the eye, the desires to either turn his head or perhaps roll his eyes battling against one another - though he managed, to his credit, to do neither.  
  
"I've never loved anyone as much as I love you." John said uncertainly, looking down for a moment. "You're the most wonderful pers-- the most wonderful thing that's ever happened to me."

 A beat.

"I never knew I meant so much to you." Sherlock responded in a monotone.  
  
John rolled his eyes.  
  
"Ha." He said sarcastically. "Christ, I'm not good at this."  
  
The doctor threw his note cards down on the parlor table and shook his head.  
  
"Mary deserves more than that." He continued almost accusingly as he pointed down at the cards. "She deserves--"  
  
"You?" Sherlock asked, folding his hands behind his back and raising his head. His friend turned to look at him again with curiosity.  
  
"Yes?" He asked, cocking his head a bit, not seeming to understand exactly what Sherlock was getting at.  
  
Sherlock shrugged slightly, and allowed his gaze to leisurely roam the flat.  
  
"She loves you." He started as though it were obvious. "What does it matter what you say?"  
  
John let out a short laugh.  
  
"This coming from someone who has never been in love and wouldn't recognize it if it showed up in a police car with sirens ringing..."  
  
Sherlock turned his head and focused his eyes so suddenly on his friend, that it knocked the clearly well meaning smile off of his face - which was replaced with confusion.  
  
"Sorry, did--"  
  
"The other day you told me that Mary came in to your life and turned it around. Changed everything." Sherlock interrupted with quick and clipped words.

John's mouth hung open just slightly for a moment.

"I didn't think you heard me."  
  
"Of course I heard you, but that's not what's important. What's important is that when I met you, you were a broken man. When I jumped off the roof of St Bart's, you could have gone back to being that broken man, but you didn't. You met Mary, and she 'changed everything.' She made you whole. That's love, isn't it?" He paused, and then widened his eyes in an almost angry look of surprise. "And it didn't even have ringing sirens attached to it."  
  
"Bloody..." John trailed off, and shifted his weight. "Can I use that?"  
  
"They're your words. I just repeated them back to you."

John nodded, before looking around the room in a faux casual way that he seemed to think Sherlock couldn't see right through. It was his precursor to broaching a topic that was either uncomfortable for him, or that he assumed would be uncomfortable for Sherlock. 

He looked back at him, then gestured noncommittally with his hand.  
  
"What I said earlier didn't offend you, did it?"

"No, of course not." Sherlock responded defensively, bunching his eyebrows. "Why would I be offended?"

The detective started off toward his bedroom.

"Oh, I don't know..." John called after him, but just as the words reached his ears, he shut his bedroom door behind him.

Sherlock swallowed, bracing his weight on his hand against the door, looking at the floor for a moment. He closed his eyes tightly, refusing to let his mind wander to the night The Woman had been standing between him and the wood he now touched. Not now. He couldn't afford to think of that now. Or... well, ever.

He turned abruptly from the door and strode over to his dresser and pulled open the top drawer, sparing the photo of him and his brother a brief glance, before reaching to the back of his socks and pulling out a smooth black object.

With The Woman's camera phone in hand, Sherlock sat slowly and heavily down upon his neatly made bed - his eyes fixed on the long blank screen.

_I imagine John Watson thinks love is a mystery to me..._

Before Sherlock's mind could wander or before he could examine the bit of plastic in his hand at all, there was a knock at his bedroom door. He looked straight ahead of him at his dresser, and a moment later, as was typical, John Watson was standing in his room - though Sherlock’s back was turned to him.  
  
At first there was only silence, but then--

"Did you love her?" John asked directly.   
  
Sherlock looked down at the phone in his hand, careful to conceal it from his friend's view. There were so many memories attached to this dead device. So many years and so much pain. It had been the catalyst and the key, and now it was a relic.  
  
Sherlock slipped his hand inside his jacket, and placed the phone in the interior pocket in a fluid movement.  
  
"No." He said, and then stood to look at John.  
  
John's eyes flickered only for a moment over the breast of Sherlock's jacket before settling back on his face.  
  
"You didn't even ask who."  
  
Sherlock furrowed his forehead with a small smirk as though that were absurd.  
  
"I don't need to know who. The answer is still no."  
  
John gestured long ways at Sherlock.  
  
"You know no one's buying your whole 'I'm a sociopath' bit anymore, right?"

Sherlock rounded his bed while buttoning his jacket.

"I'll certainly keep that in mind for when I decide to go on my killing spree." He said as he passed his friend and walked back through the door.

John laughed a bit as Sherlock passed him.

"That's not actually funny." He called from the hallway as Sherlock came to stand in front of the parlor window.  
  
"Isn't it?" Sherlock responded, and then paused for a moment as he stared out on to Baker Street. "Come on, John. Your vows aren't going to write themselves."

* * *

 

**3 Years Earlier**

The confusion and heat surrounding Sherlock's mind and physical being in this moment were equal parts dream and nightmare, just as recalling this exact slurry of emotion had been over the last few months.

Irene's hands were pressed up against his chest, moving him back toward the wall behind him as the warmth of her lips spread through his body. He felt paralyzed by her. A deep and throbbing panic was beginning to pool in the pit of his stomach, but he was so disoriented by both the familiarity and strangeness of her kiss that for a few moments he could not think himself out of the situation.

He hadn't meant for this to happen. He hadn't wanted it or planned for it, and had not allowed for it in any of his calculations of how this encounter would go. He had allotted 24 hours to this rescue mission. He'd given himself only the minimum amount of time and resources, partly to guard himself against a recurrence of the nature of their last meeting, and partly because he simply didn't _have_ the time to spare.

_I'm terrified..._

His own words echoed in his head as his lips parted and Irene's soft tongue slid against his.  

Why had he said that? Well, he'd said it because he'd meant it... Yes, but _why_ had he said it to _her_? Why had he admitted something so intimate and telling, especially when she so clearly was trying to elicit exactly that type of response from him?

It would be easy now. Easy to let her in and let himself go. There was a part of him that wanted it desperately, wanted to hold her against him until neither of them could breathe and no more words needed to be spoken. There was a part of him that had wanted it from the beginning, and a part of him that was terrified that he would always want it... but he knew better than this. He had learned this lesson already - had learned it harshly and securely, and there was nothing in his power or in anyone's power that could change what lay before them.

Sherlock began to raise his arms, and he wasn't sure if he was going to pull Irene in closer to him or push her away until the precise moment when he acted.

He pressed his hands against her upper arms and firmly pushed her from his body as he sidestepped away from her. Forcing a neutral expression over his face, he stood to his full height and smoothed his ruffled jacket.

"I'm _not_ interested." He said coldly, repeating words he said to her on the night he'd all but given her his heart.

Silence hung in the air around them for a moment as they held each other’s gaze - her with apparent frustration, and him with a sharp and practiced blankness.

"You don't trust me." She said with the lilt of an incredulous laugh in her voice. 

"Trust you?" He asked, as though it were absurd. "Since I've met you, I've been under threat of being shot at, poisoned, and _artfully_ lied to. Not trusting you has never been in question."  
  
"Telling that you say 'lied to' last like it's the worst bit."  
  
"If I believe the lie, it _is_ the worst bit _."_  
  
"Oh, but you're Sherlock Holmes. You never believed the lie."

Sherlock laughed shortly.  
  
"You'll need to get some sleep." He repeated his earlier sentiment with coolness that he knew was a little too deliberate as he stepped toward the door. His initial intention upon leaving the room had been to find someone to examine Irene's head wound, but she was showing herself to be perfectly fine... And now he just wanted to leave to get some air.

In a swift move, Irene stood between him and his exit.

"Why are you terrified?" She asked.  
  
Sherlock bit down hard in a visible flinch, mentally admonishing himself for saying such a stupid thing aloud. There was nothing he could say in response to her question that wouldn't be an obvious lie, or worse - the truth.

So he said nothing.

Irene continued to meet Sherlock's eyes in a stare that said much more than he ever suspected she would say aloud.

"Do you... _love_ me?" She asked resolutely.   
  
Sherlock let his head loll back slowly until it came in to contact with the wall so that he was leaning up against it. He drew a deep, weary breath. There were several emotions battling for his attention, but he found that what he mostly felt was tired. He wasn't sure how he'd lost control of the situation this way, but he knew for certain that he couldn't go any further down this road.

He didn't _want_ to hurt Irene... but there was only one reasonable response to her question.

"No." He answered, his eyes on the ceiling.

Irene smiled sadly.

"Why can't you bring yourself to admit it?"

Sherlock leveled his gaze with Irene's and hardened his face.

"I don't speak in riddles." He responded. "You asked me a question, and I answered. If it wasn't the answer you wanted, then I regret to inform you that the world rarely hands you exactly what you want exactly as you ask for it."

"And what do _you_ want?"

Sherlock ran his hand briefly across his mouth in a absentminded gesture and bit the insides of his lips.   
  
"I want you to get some sleep." He responded.

She shook her head slightly, her expression a mix of disappointment and exasperation.

"Sherlock... I--"

Time slowed down as Sherlock realized what was about to come out of her mouth. There was no doubt in his mind what she was going to say, and he ran through countless bits of information in his mind as though scrolling through data on a computer.

She was going to tell him she loved him.

Simultaneously, several plans of escape ran over his eyes and poured over his consciousness. He could just simply run away. He was bigger than her, and could push his way out of the room by force if she insisted on standing in his path... Which, actually, wouldn't quite do, would it? Because in the time it took him to do it, she would have said what she was going to say. He could just interrupt her, but she was a determined woman, and simply interrupting her wouldn't deter her for more than a moment or two if she were set on saying the words.

...Maybe he could just let her say it?

How would he feel once he heard it? How did he feel knowing she was about to admit what he had so long suspected anyway? He could laugh, really, because trying to examine what he felt about her sentiment toward him was like wondering about the mechanics of a bomb while its clock read 5 seconds, and it ticked away merrily in front of him.

All of this coursed its way through Sherlock's mind before Irene's mouth formed around the next word in her sentence, and before he knew what he was doing his hands were pressed against either side of her face - and his mouth was locked against hers in a kiss of blind panic.

It was to stop her talking, nothing more. He _swore_ to himself it was nothing more.

Irene's arms were around his neck in the next moment and Sherlock found himself pushing her slowly backward toward the bed, one hand tangling itself in to the curls around her ear, the other arm wrapping around her waist. And suddenly, a wave of recollection and longing came rushing back to him. He remembered this, and he remembered it so completely that it felt as though they'd never parted. The taste of her. The warmth of her. The thrumming in his veins. The promise of something... _more_. He had only felt this with her, had only ever wanted it with her...

And, as he said, it terrified him.

His world and motives were a jumble of unintelligible code laid out at his feet, and he felt that he was adrift amongst it all. He had thought that he'd let Irene drown in a sea of her own making... but now he was the one fighting to keep his head from dipping dangerously below the currents.

"What are you doing?" Irene, lips red as she pulled away from him, asked breathlessly.

Sherlock swallowed as his heart twisted itself in a knot inside his chest. What _was_ he doing? Was he only trying to protect himself from the words that he knew would be his thorough undoing? Was he _really_ just trying to shut her up?

Or was he just giving in?  
  
"I don't know." He answered, and he could hear a distinct tone of turmoil in his deep voice.  
  
His mouth found hers again.

Time seemed to slow again as he gently pushed her over on to the bed, deepening the kiss they shared and straddling her body with his knees on either side of her waist. Irene pulled away from his mouth as she tilted her head back on to the soft mattress beneath her, and Sherlock wasted no time leaning in to place quick and eager kisses along her neck and collarbone.

"Oh, God..." Irene whispered on a sigh as she buried her hands in Sherlock's hair, holding him down to her.

 _Yes..._ Sherlock's mind rejoined.

_Oh, God._

* * *

 

**3 Years Later**

  
The flat at 221B was colder and quieter tonight as Sherlock stepped through the threshold and in to his sitting room. He took a deep breath and looked around before shrugging his coat off. He walked over to a wooden dining chair and was about to drape his coat over it before his eyes landed on John Watson's wedding invitation, laying open on the table.  
  
He laughed shortly to himself before throwing his coat over it.  
  
The wedding was over now, and for the first time since he'd returned home to London... he felt alone.

He was happy for John. There wasn't one part of him that didn't truly believe that the man deserved every bit of happiness the world would ever offer him, and he had meant every word he'd spoken in his speech both before and after the wedding. He would always be there for John and Mary. He would always look out for them and their happy home, even if it meant slowly drifting away from them... Because, though it was a painful truth to accept, the life he led was not the kind of life that lent itself to being a husband and a father. And John was now to be both of those things.

No, as much as neither of them had wanted to say it, this meant the end of their adventures.

And that was fine. That was the way of things. The way of life. Sherlock had never made the error of mistaking the current with the constant, and he knew that things were always changing around him. 

Even he had changed.

Unknotting his tie, Sherlock made his way toward his bedroom. He pushed through the door and for a strangling and brief moment was struck with an almost overwhelming desire to see Irene Adler standing in front of him, but of course she was not there... and Sherlock let the feeling dissipate through the air around him.   
  
He took his suit jacket off and threw it over the chair in the corner, and opened his wardrobe to look at the mirror inside. He began to unbutton his waistcoat buttons... but his fingers slowed, and then stopped as he caught his own gaze through his reflection... and there was no denying the look of loss in them, or where the loss was felt.  
  
He took a deep breath and closed the wardrobe door before turning on his heel and striding over to his chest of drawers without another thought. In fact, there wasn't much going through his mind at all as he opened the top drawer and felt his way along the back of it before his hand came in contact with the smooth plastic and metallic casing of a mobile phone.  
  
His heart began to race just slightly as his fingers closed around the device and he pulled it out from its resting place for the second time in two months.  
  
_That camera phone is my life, Mr Holmes... I'd die before I let you take it._  
  
And hadn't she died? Once or twice now at least...

Sherlock backed away from his drawers and sat down lightly on the edge of his bed as he surveyed the dead phone in his hand in the dark. He ran his thumb along the screen, allowing himself a degree of leisure that he hadn't been able to take the time before when John had been here.

This was all he had. He didn't have a photograph or a locket, or a lock of hair as some people insisted on doing... He only had this phone. A useless piece of circuits and filigree was his only keepsake from a relationship that never existed, and his only reminder of a love that was never spoken.

Something so small and seemingly insignificant had brought The Woman in to his life and had changed it irrevocably... and he couldn't imagine not having it.

Sherlock closed his eyes as he tried to overcome the waves of emptiness that were at current making it difficult for him to draw steady breath.

It was clear to him now, in this moment, what may or may not have been clear to him even at the wedding and the weeks leading up to it, what was at the root of the lingering sense of sadness and grief.

Of loneliness.

He wasn't afraid of losing John or the friendship that had saved his life. He would always have those two things in some capacity... but the pain he felt now was due to something else entirely. Something he had never recognized himself feeling before.   
  
Jealousy.  
  
He was jealous. Jealous of John for all the reasons he had always previously felt superior to him, for in truth he had always felt superior to John in the same way that he had felt superior to everyone. It hadn't been that he had never needed love or attachments; it had been that he hadn't _wanted_ those things. Not wanting them, he had been certain, had made him free in a way that most people would never know. He didn't go through life searching for someone to spend it with. He didn't look to others for approval or validation, or _completion_. He looked to himself for those things, and had never found himself wanting.  
  
But now...

Perhaps it was that he was getting older, and when a man began to approach the time in his life when things were supposed to start slowing down instead of forever speeding up, he was forced to take a long look back at what he had accomplished with all the fast pace of youth. He had led a remarkable life thus far, to be sure, but had managed to clutter - to _fill_ \- it with very little. The rooms of his mind palace were full to the brim with memories and encounters, but only a precious few meant _anything_ to him. 

John was married now, and soon to be a father. It was always what he was headed toward.  
  
And, yes, Sherlock was jealous... because what was _he_ headed toward? What had he _ever_ been headed toward?

Sherlock opened his eyes and looked down at the phone in his hand.

"The Woman..." He muttered to himself, feeling quite tired.   
  
Standing, he went back to his drawers and replaced the phone back to its hiding spot. He didn't have the time for this kind of thing.

Just as Sherlock turned around, a text alarm emitted from his trousers. He creased his forehead and fished his phone out from his pocket. Just as he had momentarily hoped to see The Woman behind his door when he'd first stepped in to the room, he'd briefly hoped to see her name attached to the message he'd just received. He felt his heart swell at the idea, and then the feeling faded as he read the words on the small screen.

**It was brilliant meeting you tonight. You have my number now, so call me for dinner some time.**

**\- Janine**

Sherlock looked up from his phone at nothing in particular, and laughed a small quiet laugh to himself.

_Call me for dinner some time..._

**Count on it.**

**SH**

* * *

 

**8 Months Later**

 

_The truth is_

Sherlock paused at the keyboard yet again, his cursor blinking at him expectantly. There was only one truth worth admitting at this point, and he knew what it was... And he knew this would be his last chance, and still he could feel himself held back by fear. His hand hovered over the delete key for a few moments, before he pressed his lips together and continued typing.

_The truth is, I've never loved anyone more than I've loved you. I've thought countless times of countless different ways to say it, but the simplest way is often the best way. Or so I've heard. Regardless of whether that's true or not, the fact remains the same._

_I love you._ _  
_

**...**

**TBC**  
  



	10. Type

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A note about the timeline: So, we see that Mycroft is releasing Moriarty at the end of The Hound of Baskerville, which means that for my timeline to be correct... He would have had to be in custody for at least 2 months. Which, yes, is a bit excessive, but I'm okay with it if you are. ;)
> 
> Also, once again, thank you all for your continuing support. Part of the fun of writing this story is being a part of such a vibrant fandom with so many cool people to share it with. Keep on sailing that ship, guys!

**Come Attrition, Come Hell**

**Chapter 10: Type**

  
  
_I never expected to fall in love, so that when it actually happened, I couldn't see it at first for what it was. Then, of course, when it became clear to me that I'd fallen pray to a sentiment that I'd always believed to be at best useless, and at worst, destructive, it terrified me in a way that I can only imagine someone who has just flipped his car in to oncoming traffic must feel. Which is to say, it didn't appear to me that there was any clear resolution, least of which one that would not be horribly and disfiguringly painful._  
  
_My body has always been second to my mind, my emotional life to my work. I had succeeded for so long in ignoring that part of myself that experiencing it for the first time, for the only time, was like seeing a new colour that had always been just slightly off the spectrum. Can you imagine a new colour? I can't, and I couldn't imagine love. It was a new sense, a new structure in my mind's landscape._

_You were an anomaly, and one cannot trust anomalies... and so I didn't trust you._

* * *

**7 Months Earlier**

 

"So this is where the famous Sherlock Holmes hangs his famous hat." Janine said with a smirk on her face as she stepped through the threshold of 221b and looked around.

Sherlock was relatively pleased with arc of the night, and convinced that he'd played the part of "interested suitor" quite well. He'd met Janine for dinner at a spot that she had suggested, and thank God for that because if he had had to suggest a place for a date, he may have been at something of a loss. In any case, the restaurant had been quiet and dim, and he'd managed to avoid being stared at too much. He'd suspected that being out in public with a woman in a place that was known for romantic candlelit dinners would spark a little bit of gossip - though he still didn't like to consider himself a "celebrity."

Sherlock shrugged lightly.

"Well, Infamous, at any rate." He responded. "That hat is appalling."

Janine glanced at him teasingly for a moment before continuing her scan of the flat.

"No." She disagreed, laughter apparent in her voice. "It suits you."

Sherlock laughed shortly.

"People always say that with a smile on their face as though the smile makes it a compliment."

His tone was teasing and playful, but the words were genuine. He really did hate that hat.

Janine met his eyes.

"Where's the bedroom?" She asked without preamble.

Sherlock furrowed his forehead.

"Whose?" He asked, straightening his posture and tilting his head.

She laughed.

"D'ya have a roommate I don't know about?"

Sherlock continued staring at her for a moment before his face softened in understanding.

Oh, yes. He'd forgot that this was what was done. After taking a woman out to dinner it was often customary to invite her up to one's flat for casual sex under the guise of coffee or tea or some other type of arbitrary offering. He'd never been on a proper date, and so when Janine had suggested he give her a tour of his "place", it had failed to trigger the appropriate red flag. Which he could recognize as being particularly naive now, especially since he wasn't exactly an idiot. Or a virgin.

"Oh, the bedroom." He said, and then no other words would come.

Janine quirked an eyebrow up as she stared at him expectantly.

"Oh, you'd like to see it." Sherlock said dumbly, as though he were just getting the point.

"Well, I did ask for a tour."

Sherlock swallowed, his mouth feeling suddenly very dry.

"You certainly did." He said and then presses his lips in to a tight, closed mouth smile.

The pair of them stood together in awkward silence for a moment before Sherlock cleared his throat and gestured through the kitchen.

"After you."

Janine smiled and tilted her neck a bit as she walked past him under both kitchen archways, and in to the corridor that was just outside of it.

Sherlock smoothed down his not particularly wrinkled suit jacket, and followed behind her.

"It's..." She trailed as she walked in to his bedroom, and then looked at Sherlock as he walked in after her. "Neat."

Sherlock put his hands in pockets to keep from twiddling them.

"You seem impressed."

She bit the corner of her bottom lip for a moment as though trying to stifle a chuckle.

"I don't want to sound put off... but I did notice the eyeball in a jar on your kitchen table.

He creased his forehead while looking toward the kitchen, and then he looked back at her.

"Where do you keep your eyeball jars?"

Janine laughed. It seemed she was always laughing, or smiling, or smirking. Her eyes constantly shone bright, and she seemed genuinely happy. The Woman had never smiled like this... And he thought of her now, not because he wondered where she was, or whom she was with, or what she was doing, but only because she was the extent of his practical experience in this area. She was the one woman against which he could compare any other... And no, she had never smiled or laughed the way Janine did. There had always been something lurking underneath her grins and her mirth, and he never really got the impression that "happy" had been her driving force.

And just what _was_ happy? Happy sounded boring, and he could guess that The Woman would have agreed.  
  
"Not on my kitchen table."

She winked at him and walked further in to the room, taking an unhurried sweep of her surroundings before her eyes seemed to settle on something in particular. She crossed the room to Sherlock's dresser and his eyes widened slightly as she took hold of the photo of him and Mycroft. She turned to him with dancing eyes.

"Is this you?" She asked, and Sherlock was struck with how rudimentary other peoples' deduction skills were, as though the person in the photograph could have been anyone other than himself.  
  
"Indeed, it is." He answered, tilting his body a bit and looking loftily around him.  
  
"Who's that standing next you?"  
  
"It's..." He took a deep breath and shrugged. "Just my brother. Mycroft."  
  
"Mike..." She said to herself as she looked over the photo.  
  
"Well, it's Mycroft." He more or less mumbled in response.  
  
She looked up at him.

"I have to say I never would have expected something like this in your bedroom." She started gleefully. "You don't seem the type."

_Why do you keep that picture in here?_

Sherlock closed his eyes briefly and shook his head, banishing the memory of Her from his mind, and then found himself walking toward Janine. He stopped and looked down at her.

"I'm not." He responded quietly, gently taking the photo from her hands, keeping his eyes on her while placing the keepsake back upon its perch. He flipped it over quietly, though the gaze of the woman whose brown eyes he was staring in to was locked on to his own.

"No?" She asked, her tone changing and the smile fading almost entirely from her face, though it was replaced with an almost mischievous expression.

"No." His voice was deep as he shook his head once slightly.

"Then what type are you?" She asked, taking a step toward him and closing the small remaining distance between them.

Well, this was an interesting question. What type _was_ he? He was certain that there were several ways he could answer, most of them unflattering - though true - and he wasn't quite sure which one to respond with.

His eyes flickered over Janine's face from her eyes to her mouth and then back again, reading her expression in an attempt to figure out the answer she wanted to hear.

It was impossible to deny that Janine was a beautiful woman. It was impossible, even for him, to ignore that she was charming. He could see, objectively, that he would likely enjoy a physical relationship with her if he could somehow separate it out from his thoughts and his emotional awareness... But that would make him a different kind of man than what he was, and what he was, was not _that_ type.

Which, given her shallow breathing and dilated pupils, was not exactly what she wanted to hear.

"The right one." He responded simply. It was adequately flirtatious, he thought, without being overtly insinuating. It wouldn't let her down, but it wouldn't encourage her eith--

Sherlock Holmes had kissed 4 women over the course of his lifetime. He'd placed small pecks on his mother's cheek from time to time, usually in the morning at breakfast, or maybe once or twice when her birthday inevitably rolled around. Then there was Mrs. Hudson, whom he'd always had a strange attachment to, and whom he would always kiss hello if the preceding absence had been long.

There was Molly, too. One small kiss on the lips, and one soft graze on the cheek. Molly and Sherlock, through years and through trials, had both earned them. 

Then, of course, there was The Woman. The Only Woman.   
  
But where there had been 4 only moments before, there were now 5.

Sherlock closed his eyes tightly as Janine's mouth moved against his and her arms wound their way around his neck. He knew that it would come to this eventually, and he knew that if he were going to carry on this fiction with her that he'd have to pretend to enjoy it.

_What is it that you want from me, Mr. Holmes?_

Sherlock tried to lose himself in the physical sensation, because if he could just do that, if he could just turn his brain off for once in his life--  
  
_I want you out of my head._

\-- then maybe he could forget Her. Maybe he could forget that She had been here in this room, in this spot, with _her_ arms around him.

_I want you out of my head._

He'd said those words to her when it wasn't really the truth. That's not what he'd wanted from her. He'd wanted her in every way that it was possible to want her. He had wanted to be a different man for her that night. He had wanted to rewrite their history and tear himself apart for her. He had wanted to be _her_ type of man. And he _was_ her type of man.

That was one way among many that he would always be hers.

But now the words running themselves over and over through his mind _were_ true. He just wanted to forget her. He didn't want to remember her now when someone else was taking up her space.

_I want you out of my head._

Sherlock gripped Janine at the waist and pushed her up against his dresser drawers and deepened the kiss. He could do this. He _would_ do this. It was just his body. It was just his hands. It was just his mouth. It wasn't _him_.

It wasn't _Her_.

_Out of my head..._

Janine's hands were in his hair and a small noise escaped from her mouth. Sherlock ignored the sinking feeling in his stomach and pressed his body closer in to hers, mimicking the movement of her lips with his own.

But then her hands were at the buttons of his shirt.

Sherlock's heart began to pound painfully against his ribcage as Janine's fingers worked their way down his torso.

_I want you out of my head._

She was at the last button now and moving to pull the shirt out from his trousers.

_And what about your heart?_

Sherlock reached up and grabbed Janine abruptly by the wrist to stop her. 

She pulled away from him a bit to look in to his face. He took a deep breath and swallowed before letting her wrist go and taking a step back.

"I'm..." He started, but while he was searching for any way to explain this behavior, Mrs. Hudson's voice interrupted him.

"Sherlock!" She called out from the parlor. "You have a client!"

Sherlock swallowed.

"Yes, one moment!" He called back out to her without breaking eye contact with Janine, and then lowered his voice. "Forgive me, but--"

"No apologizing to me, Sherlock Holmes." Janine said with an understanding, albeit somewhat disappointed smile. She took in a breath and shrugged. "Besides, I have to be up early anyway. No time to be leisurely." She added with a wink.  
  
Sherlock smiled warmly at her, and she leaned up to place a soft kiss on his lips.  
  
"Put yourself back together." She continued quietly, tugging lightly on his shirt. "I'll let myself out."

She walked passed him and crossed the room back to the door.

"I'll solve you a crime." Sherlock thought to say just before she disappeared in to the corridor.

Janine looked at him and flashed a smile.

"Do that," she started. "And then call me."  
  
He smirked, and then Janine was gone... and then the smirk was gone.  
  
Sherlock stood rooted to where he was for several moments before running his hand absently through his hair, and beginning to button up his shirt.  
  
_And what about your heart?_ The Woman had asked.  
  
Sherlock corrected his posture and hardened his face as he started toward the door.

 _What about it_? He thought as he went to meet his client.

* * *

**3 Years Earlier**

 

"It's done." Mycroft's grave voice came from the other end of the phone that Sherlock held to his ear.  
  
Sherlock, sitting alone on his armchair, stared distantly across the flat at nothing in particular.  
  
"Wonderful." He responded in monotone. "What's he doing now?"

A beat.

"He's being... _interrogated_ at the moment."  
  
Sherlock raised his head, his eyes remaining unfocused.  
  
"Well, once you're done cleaning up after his 'interrogation'... do give him my best."

Sherlock lowered the phone from his face and ended the call without sparing the device a glance.

* * *

  **One Month Later**

 

In just a little over half a year, Sherlock's whole life had been turned completely on its head. He'd gone through so many phases of emotion and had inflicted so much double thinking upon himself, that he could hardly recall who he had been before he had ever met The Woman whose nails were currently biting in to his shoulders through the fabric of his shirt.

Except he could... and that only made all of this that much harder.

If he could trace his steps and double back, he now wondered what exactly he would have done differently. The truth is, he didn't know if he would have prevented any of it from happening the way it happened, and that was the most frightening thought; the idea that he could be presented with a way to take it all back, and refuse it. It meant...

Well, what _did_ it mean?

He couldn't focus with Irene's hands on his body. He couldn't think with her heat soaking in to his skin. It felt like he had been asleep for a long while and was just now waking up to what the real world could be like. What the real world f _elt_ like. He'd been walking in a dreamscape where feelings were dulled and it was impossible to have this. To have _her_.   
  
But now he was awake, and now he remembered.  
  
He remembered how he'd nearly been willing to give himself up that night in his bedroom. The night that was so far removed from everything else he had ever experienced that he had almost convinced himself someone else had lived it... But someone else hadn't lived it, _he_ had, and he _remembered_. He remembered how he had run out to the street and in to the rain searching for her, his heart breaking and that part of his world ending, because it _had_ ended. It _had_. And yet here it was. Here _she_ was.

Here _they_ were.

Sherlock leaned up and, without thinking, began bunching the black fabric that The Woman still wore up and around her hips.

"Sherlock..." She let out in a breathy moan, her eyes half lidded and clouded over with something Sherlock couldn't exactly identify at the moment.

His mind went nearly blank at the sight and sound, though his hands kept working until her legs were completely exposed and he had settled in between them, catching her mouth once again.

Yes, he did remember this. He remembered all of this. He knew that there was very little time now and that he was teetering precariously close to the last in a very delicate line of dominoes - that he was going to topple over and they were going to topple with him, but he couldn't bring himself to care. He had shut this part of his mind up, had filled it in with data and cases and algorithms, but it was all clearing out now...

And all that was left was Her.

He pulled away from her kiss and leaned up, holding up his weight with his palms on the bed at her sides. Her chest rose and fell in quick succession as he looked down at her, retracing the lines of a face that had been committed to memory months ago. She was beautiful, yes, but she was much more than that, too. It was physical and cerebral, something he didn't even have a word for. 

Or maybe he did, and just didn't want to use it.  
  
"Did you miss me?" She asked, a slow, lust filled smile spread across her face as she ran her hands up his torso and began to pull his black shirt open one button at a time.

Sherlock swallowed, pressing his too dry lips together as she unclasped the second button.

Did he miss her?

Sherlock thought back through the days and the weeks since he had least seen The Woman below him, and he could immediately recall an unpleasant feeling that had subtly gnawed at him from the back of his mind throughout the whole period of time. He'd mostly ignored it, had mostly been able to adjust his awareness so that it didn't matter to him... but it had been there. And it had definitely been that he had missed her.

_You're going to regret me..._

Sherlock blinked as the reality of the situation poured back in to his consciousness as though water in to a kettle.

He was going to regret this just as he regretted everything he'd done that night in his bedroom. She knew it then, and he knew it now. He had a choice here, just as he'd always had. He didn't have to give in. Not again... Because the fact of the matter was that if he _could_ change things, if he could do it all over again, he would never have walked in to that posh Belgravia flat on that sunny day all those months ago. He understood that now, and _now_ he was being given another chance to do things the right way.

He didn't have to regret another moment of his life.

"No." He answered quietly, and then he pushed himself up, pulling away from Irene and her fingers that were just about to move on to the next button of his shirt. He shifted his whole body, and came to lie softly on his back beside her - his fist clenching and unclenching against his forehead.

He didn't turn to look at The Woman, and she didn't turn to look at him. The two of them lay in bed next to each other silently for a few long moments.

"You want me." Irene stated plainly, her voice only just discernibly shaking.

"Yes." Sherlock responded honestly, and then ran his hand over his face before sitting up.

"Then why?" She sat up as well.

Sherlock pressed his mouth together, biting the inside of his bottom lip.

"Because I am _not_ my wants." His tone was nearing on defensive as he stood up from the bed completely. He turned to look at The Woman. "I'm not my desires or my feelings. I'm not an uninhibited id running rampant, blindly giving in to my--."

Irene shook her head slowly, hurt spreading across her face as she shook her head.

"That's not what this is."   
  
Sherlock pointed at her with his whole arm, his hand spread.  
  
"That's _precisely_ what this is..." He dropped his hand back to his side.

She looked disappointed and frustrated, but there was something else there, too. Something that he'd seen in his own face before, but he didn't want to focus too long on that. His stomach was sinking, his chest was tightening, and he knew he had but little resolve when it came to this woman, and as much as he wanted her, as much as he _had_ missed her, he couldn't allow this to happen again.

"You're a coward." She said.

Sherlock laughed ironically at that, though the shooting pain coursing through his body from his chest to his fingers and from his abdomen to his toes rebelled and flared at the sound.

"And you're boring." He responded with a shake of his head. "If you're going to insult me, at the very least say something worth your breath."  
  
She raised her hand to slap him, but Sherlock caught her wrist before her hand connected with his face. His posture and face barely registered the movement at all as he stared into her intense and angry gaze.  
  
"Careful." He said derisively, releasing her wrist. "You could cut yourself."

He turned away, buttoning the two buttons she had undone as he began toward the door, feeling that he was making the right choice but in the wrong way, but having no alternative recourse.

He opened the door and stopped for a moment. He looked at Irene who had crossed her arms over her chest and appeared to him as lost as a child without her mummy. He'd seen that look on her face before, too. The night he'd guessed her passcode. The night everything changed.

No, he couldn't think of that now.

"I'm going to find someone to examine your head." He started coldly, knowing no other way to proceed. "I know that you'll want to use this time to do something spectacularly stupid like trying to run away before I come back, but while that _would_ make my life easier, I've also gone to quite a bit of trouble to arrange for your escape, and I'd very much dislike for it all to have been for nothing."

He didn't bother waiting for a response, and he stepped through the door - closing it behind him.

As he made his way down the corridor to the lift, he found himself almost hoping that she would be gone when he returned.

* * *

  **3 and A Half Years Later**

Sherlock grunted in pain as he slipped his shirt over his body, already having spent nearly all of his energy pulling his trousers on.

 There had been a long few hours, possibly a day or more, when he'd been virtually incapacitated in his hospital bed - drifting uncomfortably from scattered lucidity to unconsciousness and back, over and over, making it very difficult to focus on anything or to work any of his problems out. He had known that he couldn't just lay here in hospital while John Watson remained unaware of what Mary was capable of, and that he couldn't just leave his best friend alone in the lion's den... but there had been very little do be done about it. Especially if he couldn't stay awake long enough to think about it.

Which meant, of course, that he had to keep the morphine tap low. 

Since Janine's... entertaining visit, Sherlock had turned the tap almost all the way down, and had left it that way. He'd been operating for the rest of the day under an almost unbearable amount of pain... but he could focus through pain. He couldn't focus through fog.

Now as he shrugged his suit jacket on, he had a fully formed plan ready to go... as long as he didn't lose consciousness during phases 1-3. It was perfectly acceptable to lose consciousness during phase 4; in fact it may have even been the preferable outcome. Better than dying, at any rate, which honestly was a risk he knew he was taking. The possibility of internal bleeding was not a trifle to be overlooked, yet here he was... about to overlook it.

He grabbed his coat, which seemed somehow heavier now than it ever had before and began pulling it over his arms slowly when something caught his eye.

A single rose.

Settling his coat over his shoulders, Sherlock approached the rose, though his hand reached for the card that had been placed in front of it - a large black "W" embossed over the front. He furrowed his forehead slightly as he opened the card.

He read the words to himself, and even though the card wasn't signed, there was no mistaking who it was from.

He had a vague recollection of gentle hands running through his hair, of a voice gently breaking through his haze... But for how intangible it was to him now, it could have been a dream. He didn't know if it had been real, if she had truly sat at the foot of his bed and spoken to him for the first time in years, or if she'd quickly come and gone only staying long enough to leave the flower. Or even if, perhaps, someone else had left it in her place. He only knew that this flower meant... everything to him right now. It was of singular comfort when everything else in his world had failed to live up to its own standard. He felt now that Irene Adler had always remained a constant in his life even though he'd only ever spent hours in her presence. She'd given him strength through the hell that was his crumbling reputation with 4 simple words...

_Let me come forward._

And now she was doing it again with this flower and the few words carefully penned on to the card. She didn't have to be his, and she didn't have to be present... She only had to be Her. The Woman.

He took the rose and the card and tucked them both carefully in to his inside coat pocket and opened the hospital room window. Closing his eyes for a moment to the breeze that wafted in and against his face, he took a deep breath. 

He would tell her this time. After everything was sorted out, after John was safe and Mary was taken care of... He would tell Irene Adler what she meant to him. What she'd always meant to him. And as he climbed out the window and on to the ledge outside, he knew this time that he meant it.

Just as he knew that she'd meant the words she'd written on the card.

_I believe in Sherlock Holmes._

**TBC**

**...**

 

 


	11. Tell Me Where

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello again! I'm so excited to have finally finished this chapter, and I'd like to give a shout out to Newmixgirl for sending me a beautiful playlist that was partially inspired by this story. It gave me some very much needed inspiration, and I was able to write through my block. Thank you for that!
> 
> Aaaaalso, just a quick warning that there is some M content in this chapter, and likely much more in the next chapter. :)
> 
> Thank you once again to every single person who's spent a moment on this story, and for all your beautiful reviews and your amazing support. I love this fandom more and more every day! 
> 
> Stay tuned after the story for some sparkly end notes!

**Come Attrition, Come Hell**

**Chapter 11: Tell Me Where**

**...  
**

Sherlock Holmes held out his hand expectantly, refusing to meet the eyes of his friend, knowing that this gesture and this request gave something away... But he couldn't care. Hearing The Woman's name just now had thrown him so completely off balance, that it just didn't matter to him how he looked to John Watson with his hand pleadingly outstretched for a piece of seemingly worthless rubbish that shouldn't have mattered in the least to him. **  
**

"Please." He said simply.

He could feel John's eyes resting intently on him for a moment, and could sense the thoughts and questions running through the doctor's head. He had just been on the brink of telling him that The Woman had actually been killed in Karachi, so clearly he'd believed just moments earlier that Sherlock could handle the news... But he couldn't handle the news. Not if it was real, not if it was fiction. Not at this moment. He didn't want to hear it. He just wanted the phone, because he knew this would be his only chance to ask for it, his only chance to have something tangible of hers - to remind him every so often that it was true, that it all _had_ happened.

John looked to his left awkwardly before reaching in to the plastic bag in his hands and handing Sherlock over the wiped camera phone.

He wrapped his fingers around the smooth casing, and his heart hurt for a moment.

"Thank you." He spoke tersely, but he meant the words almost more than he could bear to mean them.

Sherlock moved up slightly and immediately placed the phone in his trousers pocket, the rest of his body barely registering the action at all.

"Well, I'd better take this back." John started, gesturing with Irene's file.

"Yes." Was all Sherlock could say, still unable to look John in the eyes, electing instead to keep his gaze rooted to the eyepiece of the microscope that he kept pretending to adjust. This was not a moment he relished prolonging.

John turned and began away, but stopped at the door and turned back around. 

Sherlock braced himself for whatever was coming.  
  
"Did she ever text you again?" He asked. "After all that."

"Once, a few months ago" Sherlock responded, managing almost to keep the regret from his voice, but figuring the truth was usually the best answer if it didn't reveal too much.

"What did she say?"

_What she always says._

Sherlock took in a short breath.

"Goodbye, Mr Holmes." The words left his mouth, and they hurt just as much as though Irene was there next to him, whispering them in to his ear.   
  
John watched him. He seemed to want to say something for a moment - something comforting? More questions? But he decided against it, and then disappeared down the stairs without another word.

Sherlock looked up, his chest tight, before his gaze turned and his eyes settled on his phone where it rested on the kitchen table next to him.

Standing, and walking toward the window, he scrolled through the texts he'd received from The Woman, all the way down to the last one. The painful last one. He'd kept every message, which, in hindsight, must have meant something even at the time when he refused to believe anything meant anything. He'd kept every message, had kept her ridiculous personalized text alert tone, had kept her phone number programmed in to his phone.

He remembered now, in the months she texted him seemingly without relent, how he'd felt both frustrated and entertained each time the alert had sounded. He found himself expecting, if not looking forward to, her morning texts. Expecting, if not looking forward to, her ceaseless dinner invitations. He'd even found himself wondering, on occasion, what it would have been like to take her up on it. What if he had responded, even if just once, with "tell me where"?

Of course, it didn't matter now. She was only playing a game back then, and God only knew when it became something more.

Sherlock looked out from the window at a rain obscured Baker Street, and thought back to the last text... And even through the pain, his mouth spread in to a grin. 

He'd saved her. Irene Adler wasn't dead. She was out there, somewhere, wreaking havoc - misbehaving...  
  
Sherlock laughed at his own thoughts as he took The Woman's phone from his pocket and flipped it in the air.  
  
"The Woman..." He said to himself before opening the filing cabinet to his left. He placed the phone gently inside the drawer and was about to close it before sentiment flooded over him in almost breathtaking measure. The smile completely fading from his face, he placed his hand over the device as though wherever in the world Irene Adler was, she could feel him through it - though he knew that was more than absurd.

" _The_ Woman." he repeated, this time with the weight of everything he'd said to her before they had parted ways for the final time settling securely around his shoulders.

He looked out from the window again knowing that he'd hurt her, and knowing that he'd likely never hear from her again. There had been no more texts, and she had not yet sent any correspondence through the email he'd set up for her should such an occasion arise that she needed him. The truth was, he knew, that she _didn't_ need him. She had never _needed_ him.

She'd wanted him, and he'd wanted her, and yet he had been so merciless with her in the end.

And that was the end again, wasn't it? They were always ending, though never quite beginning.

Sherlock hardened his face and turned away from the window, leaving Irene Adler in the metal drawer along with her silly camera phone.

* * *

**3 Years Later**

 

_I would ask for your forgiveness if I didn't think you would give it to me, but I know that you would. In the same way I'd forgiven you for faking your own death, for lying to me for months, and for nearly leaving me to the wolves when it came time. I'd forgiven you almost the moment the circumstances became clear, and if I ask you to do the same for me now, you will. For the same reason I forgave you._

_But I won't ask you. You once wrote to me that it was always too late for us, and perhaps had I not been so hell bent on making sure it were true, it may not have been. I had you in my arms, and I had you in my grasp. I had you. And now I don't._

_If I were the type to pity myself, this might well be the point where I would point out several of my innate flaws and wallow in the euphoria of self-loathing... But I'm not that type, and besides that is not the point of this letter._

* * *

  **6 Months Earlier**

 

"Everyone's watching us." The Woman smiled brilliantly, her dark red lipstick a severe contrast against her pale face and white dress. Light from the chandeliers above their heads caught on her earrings as she and Sherlock swayed across the ballroom floor.  
  
"Let them." Sherlock said without removing his eyes from her mesmerizing face, leading her perfectly in time with the waltz that soared around them. The room was warm and lovely, and Irene Adler was beautiful, and though there was something in the back of Sherlock's mind tugging at him and begging for his attention, he refused to spare a thought in its direction.  
  
"I didn't know you could dance." She responded, tightening her hold on him, and it was the most wonderful thing he'd felt in years.  
  
"Byproduct of my upbringing, I'm afraid." He smiled teasingly.

"I knew it." She laughed.

"No you didn't. Knew what?"

 He twirled her underneath her arm and stretched her away from him momentarily before bringing her back in to him. 

"That there was a perfectly lovely man underneath the detective." She answered when their bodies came back together.

"Everyone sees what they want to see."

"Do they?" She asked, and then: "How is John?"

_John..._

Now Sherlock did look around. Dozens of people in formal wear lined the dance floor watching him and Irene waltz.  
  
"Well, he's..." He craned his neck in the other direction, creasing his forehead as he scanned the blank faces for his friend. "He's here somewhere. I just saw him."  
  
"Did you?" Irene asked with a tilted head.

Sherlock met her eyes.

"I took care of it." He responded gravely, suddenly remembering that Mary Watson was not Mary Watson, and that there was still so much work to be done. He tightened his arms around Irene. "Please, let me have this."

Irene rested her head on Sherlock's shoulder, and the room went dark around them. The two stopped dancing, and Sherlock held the woman in his arms as close to him as he could manage, closing his eyes and burying his face in her hair.

Even now, so many years later, he could recall this scent with absolute clarity.

God, he loved this woman.

He opened his eyes, and realized that she was no longer in his arms, but was now standing with the nameless dozens that had been watching them dance. They were all staring at him now, and a dull ache beneath his ribcage began to throb its way to a searing pain.

"Meet me when you wake up." The Woman said, and her voice sounded somehow far away though she was right in front of him.

"Tell me where." Sherlock grunted, his hand going to his chest, the pain becoming unbearable as he fell to his knees, but the room was empty now. "Irene!"

**...**

Sherlock opened his eyes just as he was taking in a large exhale of breath, as though waking from a nightmare. The sound of his own voice had barely just registered in his ears, though he wasn't sure why, or what he'd just said. Quickly, several things in his immediate environment made themselves known to him. Aside from the fire in the middle of his chest, there was the beeping of the machine at his side, the oxygenation monitor clasped to his fingertip, the needle taped to the inside of his arm...

And John Watson sitting in the corner in a hospital armchair, his mouth obscured by his hand, his eyes focused intently on Sherlock.

"You talk in your unconscious stupors." He said blandly, moving his hand away, but not sitting up from his slumped position. He looked tired and only mildly angry, but that had always been John's way. Even the subtlest expression on his face conveyed so much.

"I've never noticed." Sherlock responded, his voice a mere rasp of itself as he slowly brought the head of his bed up higher, and he paused for a moment. "What was I saying?"

A beat.

"You were calling out for Irene." He laughed shortly, almost bitterly. "At least you knew yours was an insane criminal from the start."

Sherlock furrowed his brow.

"Mine?"

"The woman you love."

Sherlock was so surprised to hear those words from his friend's mouth and directed at him, that he was stunned silent.

John cleared his throat.

"All I ever wanted was a normal--" He cut himself off and shook his head slightly, finally sitting up. "I loved Mary--"

"You still love Mary."  
  
"I loved _Mary_!" He interjected, not loudly, but harshly. "I don't even know what her bloody name is now."

Sherlock all but rolled his eyes in exasperation. He had hoped as he fell to the ground between Mary and John Watson at Baker Street, his life hanging in the balance, that this would have been sorted out by the time he woke back up again. He thought he'd... taken care of it.

"What does it matter what her name is?" He asked. "Whether I call you John, or Watson, or Doctor, how does it change anything between us? You're still the same person, whatever name I call you."

John smiled as he bit his lip, not one bit of mirth in his eyes.

"You really don't understand, do you?" He asked, shaking his head. "How did you feel when you realized Irene had staged her death? That she'd lied to you?"

Sherlock swallowed, unprepared for that kind of question. It was as though John had already assimilated the knowledge of Sherlock's feelings for The Woman - that he held is as true simply and without further inquiry.

 Sherlock opened and closed his mouth once without speaking, unsure of what he was going to say, before he decided upon a word.

"Elated." He admitted, finally relenting a truth that he'd been holding on to for the better part of 3 and a half years.  
  
John laughed shortly and sat back.

"How can I love someone who I don't even know?"

Sherlock took in a deep breath, pressing his lips together tightly.

"Because... you can never really know anyone." He started. "We're not the stories we tell, or the crimes we solve, or the secrets we keep. We are whatever's beneath all that, whether it's a lonely man searching for something to hold on to, or a scared woman trying to find a place where she fits in the world."

John was silent, his eyes sharp.

"Everything she's made you feel was true, and she loves you." Sherlock continued. "What does it matter if the rest of it was a lie?"

"I can't trust her now."

It was Sherlock's turn to laugh a bit.

"Trust." He repeated John's word as though it was trivial, closing his eyes as he settled his head back on his pillow. "You can spend years worrying about whether or not you can trust her, and at the end of those years you can look back on the wasted time and opportunity, and at the hole that you managed to dig out of your heart and your life... And then you can congratulate yourself, at least, for causing her as much pain as you were trying to avoid causing yourself."

Silence filled the room for more than just a few moments, so Sherlock opened his eyes again to look at his friend who, for his part, was staring open mouthed back at him.

"Also keep in mind that I'm hooked in to quite a pleasant amount of morphine." Sherlock finished.  
  
"Love advice from Sherlock bloody Holmes." John responded incredulously. "The world really has turned completely upside down."

"Yes," Sherlock said with a smirk. "And I suspect hell is in the process of freezing over, so if I should actually happen die from this ordeal, now might be the perfect time for it."

John took a deep breath.

"Jesus, Sherlock." He ran his hand over his face. "I don't know if I'm going to be able to forgive her."

"Well, she shot me... and I've forgiven her. We all have our obstacles to overcome."

John laughed, and though it was small, it seemed genuine.

A moment of silence passed between them.

"So, you did love her then?" John asked. "Irene Adler."

Sherlock let out a small puff of air from his nose as though something were funny, turning his head to look out from the window.

"God, I'm going to be in here for months now, aren't I?" He asked, passing John's question over entirely.

There was a second's pause where Sherlock wasn't sure if John would let the subject go, but then his friend spoke.

"Wouldn't hurt you to take a break." John said. "You do have a hole going through your chest at the moment."

Sherlock breathed in and closed his eyes yet again.

 _Yes,_ he thought.

"I suppose I do."

* * *

**3 And A Half Years Earlier**

Sherlock sat alone at the hotel bar staring blankly off in to space, his elbow on the bar and his face rested just slightly against his loose fist, a single neat scotch sitting untouched in front of him.

He'd been sitting in much the same position for about an hour now.

What he really wanted was a cigarette, but the universe rarely saw fit to have those close at hand when he needed them, and this moment was no exception.

He wondered if, perhaps, he could get away with staying down here until the time came for him and The Woman to depart the place, but he knew there was more to go over with her than just a few passing moments would allow... and he'd have to return to the room at some point. He'd have to get through this.

Just this. Then it would be over. Then he could carry on with his life.

_The same way you carried on with it 2 months ago?_

Sherlock bit down at the thought, and stood suddenly from his seat.

Leaving behind the alcohol he was never going to drink to begin with, he started back for the room.

Turning in to the lobby, his thoughts were rushing at him from all directions, and as he made his way to the corridor he found that his heart was racing.

He hit the button on the lift harder and more times than was necessary and waited for the doors to open.

They didn't.

And after a few more moments, they still hadn't.  
  
Sherlock let out a low sound of frustration and began toward the staircase.

As he ascended the first flight of stairs, he recalled The Woman's parting words to him upon their last meeting.

_I got Sherlock Holmes to beg..._

_You were a game. A hobby. A pet._

His stomach dropped and his legs felt suddenly unsteady beneath him as the words replayed themselves in his head. Why... why did they bother him so much? Even now.

As he rounded the second flight, his thoughts turned to what it felt like to be reunited with her after her two-month absence from his life - especially after having had to wonder through some of that whether or not she was alive. He had felt relief, and happiness, and...

Yes, dammit. Love. And hate.

He rounded the third flight of steps, the ones that would lead to the corridor to the room where The Woman awaited, and--

They nearly collided. If he hadn't looked up at the last moment, they would have.

It was her, eyes wide and lips parted. Clothed in the simple white hotel robe, her hair down and wet, her face clean and bright and perfect. She looked so much like she had that last day in his parlor as she'd tricked him in to giving a national secret away... The same as she had as he held her hand and took her pulse.

It was too much.

"Sherlock--"

He wrapped his arms around her waist and pushed her roughly up against the stairwell wall, his lips descending upon hers in a mad flurry of lust and emotion, her sentence ending abruptly with a surprised gasp. He didn't know it was what he was going to do before he did it, and from here to the next second he didn't know if he'd let her go.

He'd felt lust before, and need, and want. He'd felt all of those things with Irene. He'd felt longing and time and distance, and pain - so much repressed pain. He'd felt them, and he'd ignored them or didn't, had acted on them or hadn't... and it had all been processed and catalogued. Coded and logged. He'd taken those emotions and senses in as unwillingly as it had been, and he knew them for what they were now. Things that only Irene Adler had ever made him feel.

But what he was feeling at current was something different.

Now as Sherlock's hands ungracefully pulled the white robe up around Irene's hips, and as her hands quickly worked to unbutton his trousers, what he felt was deeper and darker than anything he'd felt with The Woman before.

He knew what he was doing. There was no fog, no confusion, no ambivalence. He wanted her, and for the first time since he'd become aware of his feelings - he didn't care what happened after this. He needed this. Even though he knew - he _knew_ \- he was hurting himself in the long run, and hurting the woman who he apparently loved, he didn't care. His heart was broken and his world was shaken, and Irene had always been too far away to have or to hold.

So, it wasn't love, or desire, or lust that fueled the passion that burned in his chest as he wrapped Irene's legs around him.

It was spite.

He was taking it out on her now. Everything. Everything she'd ever forced him to feel.

She gasped as he pushed up against her, and though he felt something like joy or relief or whatever the hell it was, he didn't give either of them enough time to examine their emotions.

He pushed again for the way she'd made him miss her when he'd thought she was dead.

Again for the way she made him thank an imaginary God that she was alive.

Again for the way she had fooled him and broken him in so many different ways.

Again for the way his hands had shaken as he pressed in the last letter in her passcode.

_I was just playing the game..._

_I know._

Again for showing up in his bedroom and forcing a realization upon him that he could have lived his whole life without.

Again for making him _beg._

_Don't go._

_Again_ for making him love her.

Again, and again, until she was moaning unintelligibly against his hair as he raked his tongue and teeth against her neck and ear.

She was his current drug of choice - simultaneously comforting and destroying him in equal measure.

"Don't stop..." She sighed, and he somehow managed to understand her words through the panting.

He pulled his head away and leveled his intense gaze on her, meeting her glossy and still wide eyes.

"Hold on." He responded hoarsely.

He pulled her arms around his neck and pulled her away from the wall, abruptly starting up the stairs with her in his arms.

As per her request... he had no intention of stopping.

* * *

  **4 Years Later**

 The sun was coming up now, and Sherlock knew that the car would be coming round for him soon. Mycroft had done a merciful thing in letting him spend his last night in London at 221b. His home. His sanctuary.

Though Sherlock did suspect that there was heavy surveillance on the flat, he wouldn't have tried to run even if he thought there wasn't. There would have been very little point in it. It was all going to amount to the same thing - his exile from the home that he now understood was so much more a part of him than he had ever known before, which was saying something, because he _had_ already known.

2 years forced away after what he now privately thought of as "the fall" was nothing compared to the permanence he was now faced with.

Except it wasn't permanent, was it? It was only going to be 6 months, if Mycroft was to be believed... And Mycroft was always to be believed.

Sherlock stood from where he'd been typing at the simple wooden dining table that had always been here and would likely remain after he was gone, and went to the window. He pulled back the drapes in his usual way to watch the sun come up over Baker Street for what he realized was the last time, and he was forced to swallow back against the emotion it stirred up in him.

He could remember now pulling back these curtains for the first time, watching a police car pull up.

_Four. There's been a fourth._

A Study In Pink, John had called that particular case. The first crime Sherlock had solved with his blogger... his best friend.

His best friend.

Well, he'd vowed to do whatever it took to protect him and to protect Mary, and he had fulfilled that vow. The only vow he'd ever made - his first and last. Little did he know when he spoke those words at John's wedding how right he had been.

Sherlock let the drapes fall closed again, and he looked down. His eyes drifted over to where his computer sat open on the table and took a deep breath.

He took the few steps back to his seat, and returned his hands to the keyboard.

 _By now you've no doubt heard from some source or another of what I've done,_ he typed.

He paused, closing his eyes for a moment against the memory of--

_Merry Christmas!_

\-- what had happened. What he had done. There was very little benefit in punishing himself with the recollection, and he had no intention of doing so.

_Given that likelihood, I'm sure you understand what I am saying to you, and why I am saying it._

_I'm sorry. I'm sorry for all the ways I hurt you, and for all the ways I let you go when I didn't have to... But more than that, I'm sorry for only now understanding you. I understand the importance of your camera phone and the protection I took away from you. I understand how frightened you must have been when I left you standing there with my brother on your last night in London._

Of course he understood that. After all, he just had his own last night.

_And I know now what I should have done. When you were texting me and were still within my reach and my scope, instead of ignoring you, instead of ignoring myself... When you asked to meet me for dinner..._

_I should have said, "Tell me where."_

**...**

**TBC**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, if I didn't beat you over the head with it, the dream sequence was my way of writing a wedding scene with Sherlock and Irene. I had to get that out of my system, and this is the only way it would have worked in this story. I like to imagine that they're dancing to something like "First and Last Waltz" by Nickel Creek (which you can listen to here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_UCyvyZa92o ), and not just because it was what I danced to at my wedding. ;) I just think it's a beautiful and bittersweet piece of music, and the name including "first and last" resonated with me as I did mention Sherlock's "first and last vow" in this chapter. So, give it a listen if you want some feels.
> 
> Lastly, I felt super dramatic while writing the last scene in this installment, and I like to imagine Sia's "Elastic Heart" playing lowly in the background until the last line where, if this were a movie, the scene would cut to black and the music would pick up as the credits begin to roll!… But that's just me. If you want to experience the magic with me, you can listen to that song here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s5lwLlaIfzY
> 
> Thank you so much for reading!


	12. How Would You Know?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning:This chapter has an M rating! 
> 
> I really hope you guys enjoy this installment. It was a bit taxing at times, especially the beginning scene as I had to balance what I wanted to say with what I thought the characters would say… So, we'll see. I think it's actually my favorite vignette in the whole story so far, and it's not even between Sherlock and Irene! 
> 
> Thank you for reading!

**Come Attrition, Come Hell**

**Chapter 12: How Would You Know?**

**...**

  
  
Sherlock sat silently in the small nondescript room, his back straight against a cold metal chair, staring across the table at his own reflection in the wall that was half mirror, half concrete. He knew that it was more than just his own eyes staring back at him from behind the glass, but he refused to look down or away as though he were a child being punished. Let them stare at him, he figured, and let them speak about him in their legal tones.  
  
Just the day before, after all, was the day that Sherlock Holmes had become a murderer.  
  
The door to the interrogation room opened behind him, and though he didn't move, he could see the reflection of Mycroft step in and close the door.

The older man rounded the metal table slowly, and took a seat opposite his little brother, though Sherlock continued to stare forward, just shy of meeting his eyes.

Neither man spoke for a long while. Neither moved. Neither seemed to breathe. This was not a usual moment. It was not just another one in a thousand interactions between Sherlock and his brother, where there was always a crackling energy of rivalry and hostility - of competing wit and information. This was new. This was different. The uncanny circumstance was harsh against the backdrop of the Christmas of just yesterday, and it burned too bright to focus on. If there were no words spoken in the first ten minutes that Mycroft sat before his little brother in the small, grey, hateful little space the two of them now occupied, it wasn't for lack of words to speak.

Because if silence was not silent, if silence could be a sound... The Holmes boys were screaming at each other.

Sherlock turned his gaze slowly to meet Mycroft's without turning his head.

"Why?" Mycroft's simple inquiry finally broke the quiet.

Sherlock blinked once, purposely.

"Don't." He said, and the word was pointed, the last letter annunciated deliberately.

Mycroft sat back with something of a small sigh.  
  
"Of course not." He responded almost blandly.

Sherlock grit his teeth, though he remained still.

"And are there people chanting in the streets yet?" He asked with a decidedly bitter catch in his otherwise very calm, almost bored, lilt. Not that it mattered, really, or that he truly cared... Or rather, not that he had ever cared about that type of thing before. "Thousands of Sally Donovans yelling out their 'I told you so's..."

But as he spoke, it abruptly occurred to Sherlock that Mycroft appeared to him somehow different than he ever had before. He had never seen him look sad or lost... but he did now. Which was more frightening and more surreal than anything he had felt yet today, or in any previous point in his life. Mycroft had always been made of ice and steal, and underneath that had always been calculation and control.

But, Sherlock supposed, that is what most people would have said about him as well, and honestly, he couldn't even try to pretend that it was true anymore. He was always going to love people differently than they expected or wanted, differently, maybe, than they even understood... But the fact remained that he did love. He did... feel. He had never wanted to, no, but he had never wanted a lot of things that he ended up getting in the end.

And now here he was - a man who had loved and lost. A man who had seen a friendship through its worst and best times, all the way to its end. A man who had literally committed murder to protect the people he cared about most.

So, here the two of them sat. Sherlock, for the first time, seeing himself and his brother for what they really were.

Human.

"No." Mycroft answered, and the way his countenance was suddenly wiped clean of the expression Sherlock had just been ruminating over was clearly deliberate. Perhaps he had seen it reflected in his little brother's face. "We're keeping this quiet."

Sherlock turned his head completely toward Mycroft at that in confusion, his eyebrows coming together for a moment.

"Quiet?"

Mycroft raised his head.

"There will be no trial," he started. " And this will not be in any of the newspapers. We can't afford for Sherlock Holmes to be a murderer."

Sherlock swallowed, feeling himself beginning to shake from the pit of his stomach outward.

_Psychopath._

_Freak._

_Murderer._

It was true. Today it was all true.

"We?" He asked, even though it was suddenly difficult to speak.

"Britain."

Sherlock laughed shortly through his nose, though no smile appeared on his face.

"A government cover up, Mycroft? If I'm to be imprisoned for the rest of my life, I think someone will notice eventually."

There was a heavy pause, and Mycroft's face began to register several more emotions that Sherlock had never seen it take on... but he couldn't read them.

"You are not to be imprisoned."

Sherlock’s mouth began to form around the word "what", which would likely have led to the question "what are you going to do with me, then?"... But the word never came out, and instead his forehead rose in realization, as he remembered their previous conversation not 24 hours before this moment.

_MI6, they want to place you back in Eastern Europe. An undercover assignment that would prove fatal to you in, I think, about 6 months..._

"I see." he said quietly, his perfect posture finally failing him as he, too, slumped back in his chair, his eyes becoming far away. "So, I shall not be declining your job offer, after all?"

Mycroft looked down.

"Sherlock, if I could protect you from this--"

Sherlock snapped his attention back to his brother suddenly.

"I need to make some phone calls." He interrupted, unwilling to hear whatever Mycroft was about to say. He didn't want an apology, or a sentimental oration. He already knew that if there were any other way, that his brother would have found it. There was no point in delving any further.

Mycroft paused for a moment, but Sherlock's stoicism was absolute, and it left no room for argument here. 

"Naturally." Mycroft said finally. "I'll need to know who first."

"Molly Hooper. Lestrade. Mrs. Hudson." Sherlock rattled off without thought or hesitation.

Mycroft furrowed his forehead.

"John?"  
  
"He'll see me off."

Of course he would.

"Indeed."

But that wasn't all he needed, and since he likely had very little time to negotiate the terms of his exile, he continued on, his eyes narrow and his face hard.

"And if I were to ask you to see to the safety of my friends, to make absolutely certain that--"

"I'll check in on them, from time to time." He said, which meant, of course, that he would have someone else check in, but that was assurance enough Sherlock supposed. "Anything else?"

A beat.

"Yes." He answered. "There is one more thing."

To Sherlock's surprise, Mycroft smiled a small, almost knowing smile.

"Irene Adler, I presume?" He asked.

Sherlock's eyes narrowed slightly further to the unexpected reply, but he managed to keep the rest of his face neutral.

"Oh, come now." Mycroft went on. "You didn't think you were the only person who knew she was still alive, surely. We've been aware for quite some time."

"And how long is that, exactly?" The younger Holmes asked, rotating his jaw momentarily.

Mycroft ticked his head about a degree to the left in an almost nod, his eyebrow shooting up for just a moment.

"So. Shall we put her on your list?" He responded, ignoring Sherlock's question... And the younger brother knew better than to push for the answer.  
  
"... No." He swallowed, his eyes averting somewhat downward. "Then you have a file on her, I suspect?"

He looked back up.

"Of course we do."

He nodded slowly.

"... Is she well?" He asked, attempting to appear somewhat disinterested even as he knew asking the question at all belied the act.  
  
"Quite well, in fact." A pause. "And safe."

Sherlock's mouth became a thin line on his face, feeling the strain of emotion in his neck and jaw. She was well. Safe. That was all she had ever wanted, wasn't it?

No, it wasn't.

"My last request is that you allow her back in to London."

Mycroft seemed somewhat confused by _this_ at least.

"Seems like a poor last request."  
  
"Yes, but..." He faltered a bit, but only for a split second. "But it is, nonetheless, my _last_ request."

Mycroft poked the inside of his cheek with his tongue as he took in a deep breath. Sherlock knew this was probably a bit much to ask of his brother, but what did it matter?

"I'll see what can be done."

Sherlock blinked.

"Thank you."

Mycroft laughed shortly.

"Sentiment." He said almost as though the word were distasteful to him.

Sherlock's face twitched briefly in to something like a smirk as he averted his eyes to the far wall for a moment, straightening his posture again as he did so.

"Well, we can't all be Mycroft Holmes, can we?" He asked, and then looked back at his brother.

"Yes... And I suppose you shall elect to keep me in the dark over just why exactly you chose to... do what you did?"

Sherlock said nothing, his face a blank mask.  
  
Mycroft took a deep breath, and then reached in to his inside jacket pocket to reveal Sherlock's black iPhone. He placed it on the table and pushed it toward his brother.

"3 phone calls, then." He stood. "I'll leave you to your privacy."

"And John?"  
  
"I'll arrange everything with John. I should imagine he would be quite willing to... see you off."  
  
"I suspect so."

Mycroft nodded. His hands stretched slightly outward at his sides as he turned to go... but he stopped just short of the door, and turned around to face his brother.

"Oh, and by the way, little brother..." He started, his eyes on the floor. "About what you said earlier. People chanting out hatred for you in the streets and all that." He paused, looking up. "If that's what you believe would happen, you're wrong. The people quite rightly 'believe in Sherlock Holmes'... or haven't you heard?"

Sherlock swallowed, his face rigid. Even though it didn't come near it, really, that was the closest Mycroft had ever come to expressing any kind of pride in him... and at now of all times.

Mycroft left the room without another word.

The exhausted man let out a shaking breath that he felt he had been holding throughout the entirety of his interaction with his brother... and it was quite a few moments before he felt composed enough to take the phone from the table.

Staring at the screen for a long moment, he stole himself for what was not going to be an enjoyable few conversations. He dialed the first number.

One ring. All it took was one ring.

The woman on the other end picked up after one ring, because his friends picked up when he called. His friends came running when he texted. His friends loved him. He wasn't prepared to say goodbye, and now that he knew he had to... he didn't know what to say.

"Molly..." Sherlock started, and clenched his eyes closed. "Do you have a moment?"

She did. Sherlock breathed in deep.

"I have something I need to speak to you about."

* * *

**3 and A Half Years Earlier**

 

Sherlock stepped over the threshold in to his flat and looked around for a moment, feeling utterly exhausted and emotionally spent. There weren't many times in his life where he felt as though he needed a break, but this was one of them. The days and weeks ahead of him were going to be painful and difficult in ways he was sure he couldn't even imagine at the moment, and all he wanted to do right now was breathe.

John Watson looked up at him from his arm chair.

"Oh, you're back." He said, closing the book that he held open in his lap.  
  
"Astute observation." Sherlock responded monotonously.  
  
John smiled the sort of smile that usually appeared on a person's face before he laughed, except he didn't laugh.  
  
"It's a good color on you." He said, gesturing with his index finger at his own face, but clearly referencing the bruise that had formed on Sherlock's cheek, temple, and under-eye.

Sherlock brought his fingers up and tentatively felt along the tender portion of his face before half rolling his eyes and dropping his hand back down to his side.

"Yes, well... with clients like mine, who needs enemies?" He asked, sauntering slowly over to his own chair and sitting down heavily.  
  
"You know you had it coming."  
  
Sherlock's face shifted in to a genuine glare.  
  
"Why do you think that family came to me, John?"

"For help." 

"No, they didn't come to me for help. They came to me for answers. And when I gave them answers, they started crying and hurling off-the-mark insults at me in ignorant indignation."  
  
"Well, to be fair, it was only the little girl who cried."  
  
"And I was supposed to..." He shook his head and shrugged pointedly, because he was sincerely at a loss in this case. "What? What exactly was I supposed to do?"

"Sorry, before or after you were being punched in the face?"

Sherlock sat up, his face darkening.  
  
"I don't tell people what they want to hear, because what people want to hear rarely relates in any way to reality. If they wanted to be coddled and told everything was okay, then they should have gone to a support group for the terminally delusional."

John cocked his head back a little, beginning to look concerned.

"Are--"  
  
"I'm fine."  
  
"You don't even know what I was going to ask."  
  
"You have the 'are you okay' look on your face."

"Well, you have the 'I'm not okay' look on yours." He paused. "Did your conversation with Mycroft not go well?"

Sherlock pursed his lips just a bit, looking to his side for a moment, and then back at his friend.

"What did you find out from Lestrade?"

John sighed.  
  
"The woman at Charing Cross." He started, and then cleared his throat. "It was Louise Clarke... but then, you already knew that."

A moment passed, and then Sherlock smirked almost to himself, though it didn't soften his face.

Ah. There it was. He did know. He knew, because he observed. He was paying attention.

Up until this moment, Sherlock has assumed that Moriarty was _going_ to target him, and that he was _going_ to send him his own message. Which had been all the more reason to get the man in to custody as soon as could be managed... But that wasn't right. He'd been missing the bigger picture. The cracks in the jigsaw puzzle had obscured the image. But he could see it now.

The murders. The tying off of loose ends. The very public show of power. This wasn't to send the criminals of London a message. This message was to Sherlock... Just like the pink phone, and the trainers, and the puzzles had all been calculated to catch Sherlock's attention, to start a trail of breadcrumbs that would ultimately draw him out to the pool that night so many months ago; these murders, this pattern, were meant to tell Sherlock that something was coming.

That Moriarty was coming. 

But then, of course, that meant--

_Find me..._

\-- Moriarty wasn't just going to go after Irene Adler because she had lost the phone, or because she was useless to him, or because she had disappointed or angered him. No. Moriarty was going to go after Irene, because he knew that Sherlock had let her go. After everything. After the humiliation and the lies. After using him as a pawn in her game... he hadn't _insisted_ that she be dealt with in a manner that not only would have been justified, but possible, given his brother's position in the government. To someone from the outside, someone who was _paying attention_ , that may have looked like an act of kindness from someone not yet prepared to see The Woman fall.

And Jim Moriarty was "just as clever" as Sherlock. He would have been paying attention, too.

Irene Adler was on the run from a psychopath, possibly dead, because he had let her go... And because she had meant something to him. She was the outlier in a string of only a few people Sherlock cared about. She was the fuse that would ignite the bomb.

So the card hadn't meant "find me, I'm in trouble"...

It meant "find me before he does."

And he had to. He had to find her... and if she wasn't dead already, Jim Moriarty would need to believe that she was.

Sherlock looked at John. His friend. Part of the bomb that Sherlock had already known was in place... but he just hadn’t known the timer had already begun to tick down.

But he did now.

"Yes," Sherlock responded finally. "I suppose I did."

* * *

**3 and A Half Years Later**

**  
**

_That I never replied to you, however, is not my main regret.  I couldn't have replied. You paralyzed me. I couldn't read you, and I couldn't analyse you, as I'd had no previous experience to compare your actions against. I was unable, through the texts you sent, to gain any kind of insight in to you or your motives, and anything I would have replied with would have been too telling. I was unwilling to hand you information about me when all I really knew about you was your phone number. That's just me, and you always knew that._

_My main regret, Ms Adler, is Islamabad._  

* * *

 

  **3 Years, 5 Months Earlier**

 

Sherlock pressed Irene up against the hotel room wall, the door barely just closing behind them, The Woman pushing Sherlock's shirt down his arms. The new feelings, and thoughts, and sensations were bombarding him from all sides and from every angle. His heart raced with different emotions than it had the only other night in his life when he had found The Woman's lips and body against his.

He felt burning anger now. A simmering and consuming fury that made him pull the white robe from The Woman's shoulders in an abrupt jerk, down her arms and away from her body, throwing it somewhere elsewhere in the room without agility or grace. He had wanted it off of her _now_ , and now it was off. 

She met his eyes as she pushed his trousers and pants down his legs, and there was a noticeable intensity of her own in them, but he spent no time allowing himself to analyze what it was. He didn't care. He didn't care what she felt. He didn't care what _he_ felt _for_ her.

Why should he care what she felt while he was on fire?

He'd repressed it all for too long. He'd let it go unanswered for _too_ long. It had always been there, always. In the back of his mind. Coloring his thoughts. Coloring his views. Coloring his life. It had all changed, hadn't it? When he had pushed the door open to find her in his bedroom. Everything had changed. And he'd known it then. He had known the moment he dropped to his knees in front of her for a desperate and heartbroken kiss that he would never be the same.

And he wasn't.

Now as he pinned The Woman to the wall with his weight, his hand burying itself tightly in the underside of her hair, he wasn't the same. Now as he shuddered in to her lips against the sensation of his bare torso pressed to her breasts, he wasn't the same. Now as he roughly pulled The Woman's left thigh up against his waist, he _wasn't_ the same.

She had broken him, and she had changed him, and this - everything - was _her_ fault.

He wanted her now, badly. More, he realized, than he had ever wanted anything. This wasn't him, it had _never_ been him, except it _was_. If this was happening now, it was because it had always been in him. It was because The Woman had found a way to breach his reserves and his walls, and his heart, and now she was in there. Inside. Scratching away at everything that had ever made him whole. Everything that had ever made him who he thought he was. But who was he now?

Who. Was.  He?

Sherlock's breath caught, his mouth hovering open near hers, and time stilled just for a moment as he pushed himself up and inside of The Woman that had destroyed him.

He wanted her. He wanted her so badly even now as he had her. He _loved_ her.

And God he despised her for it.

So, if he was on fire, if he was going to burn, then he'd let her catch fire right along with him.

The overwhelming emotion that Sherlock felt pound in his chest made his fingers dig a little too deep in to The Woman's flesh at her hip, and she gasped in to his kiss... Though he didn't get the feeling that it was in disapproval.

"Oh, god." He grunted, pulling his mouth away from hers and resting his forehead against the wall at her side of her face.

"Are you a believer, Mr. Holmes?"

Sherlock brought his head back from the wall and leveled his gaze at her. Her eyes were bright and her skin was sheened over with sweat... And he could see her for all the ways that she was wonderful. He could see her for her wit and her cunning. He could see her for her cleverness. He could see her for her singular grade of elegance. He could see her for her beauty, too, because she _was_ beautiful. It was all in her eyes and in her hands as they held on to him for dear life. It was all in her sharp smile.

Sherlock Holmes. Torn apart by a woman. One woman. _The_ Woman.

He pushed suddenly and roughly against her, and her eyes slid shut - a far too appealing noise escaping from her parted lips.

"No." Sherlock responded from behind gritted teeth.

He pulled her away from the wall suddenly at that, and turned them around - pushing The Woman back several paces until her legs hit the bed and she landed backward on to the soft white sheets underneath her.

Sherlock moved at a steady pace on top of her now, his breathing quick but controlled as he stared down at Irene, his hands on either side of her face on the bed. She stared up at him, meeting his eyes, meeting his movements; her hands wrapped around his arms.

A shadow seemed to cross her face for a moment.

"You do love me, don't you?" She asked, raising her hips upward as rhythmically as Sherlock moved against her. Now it was his turn to close his eyes against the physical sensation. He could hardly reconcile how good his body felt, when inside he was in agony.  
  
He said nothing.

Her fingers moving gently across his cheek forced his eyes back open, and he found her staring up at him, her eyes knit together in what looked almost like concentration.

"You do..." She almost whispered. Sherlock raised his head.

Could she see it in his face? Was it reflected in his silence? In his body? Was he touching her in a way that was usual of someone who was in love? Could she read it in his damn heartbeat the way he had been able to read her feeling in her pulse?

Sherlock reached up and took hold of her hand that was still caressing his face, entwining their fingers for a moment, and then held her hand to the bed.

"I told you." He said, pressing a little harder against her as he spoke. "I'm not a believer."

She took in a sharp breath, pressing back against him.

"But you feel it." She said, her voice low and seductive.

Yes, he _felt_ it.

Sherlock tilted his head. Even now as he felt such an intense urge to hold her, to allow himself the comfort of her, to _love_ her... He also wanted to make her feel as devastated as he did, and he hadn't felt such an odd awareness of vindictive desire since the night he had stared her in the eyes, changing her life forever with 4 simple letters. 

"I don't love you."  He said, and his voice cracked just slightly.

A slow and lust filled smirk spread over Irene's face, though it didn't quite reach her eyes.

"Show me what it feels like to _not_ be loved by you, then."

Sherlock smiled a dark half-grin. That was a reasonable request.

He shifted his weight, and began running his palms down The Woman's arms before reaching her hands and clasping them with his. He moved them slowly out to her side before abruptly pulling them up over her head, pressing them to the mattress.

"You..." He said, allowing himself the sense of awe as he took in her perfect nude form; the curves of her body that were so unlike the flat lines of his. She was soft where he was bone, painfully exquisite where he was angular and harsh.

He kept one hand over her wrists, and moved the other slowly down and over her collar bone, her breasts, her side, and then her hip. She was smooth and magnificent, and every other ridiculous and sentimental word in his vocabulary that he could think of to describe how utterly brilliant she was to him.

"Me." She responded, arching her body as he continued to move his hips with hers.  
  
"You said I'd regret you."  
  
"And did you?"  
  
Sherlock swallowed.

The Woman let out a long, low moan, moving her head back against the bed as her eyes closed and Sherlock's widened.

He hadn't realized he had quickened his pace, or that his breathing was no longer even or controlled.

"Yes." He responded to her question, but the word came out nearly as a hiss. He could feel the Woman straining against his hold on her wrists above her head, but he didn't let her pull away, and if the sounds escaping her were any indication, she didn't mind.

And through all the intensity and fog of lust and want, Sherlock realized that this really was the last time he would have The Woman this way.

The throb of emptiness and heartache in his chest made him angrier than he had yet been, and it manifested itself in a deep thrust of his body against Irene. She groaned nearly to the point of screaming, and Sherlock's mouth descended on hers to stop the noise up. He swallowed her cry of pleasure and was aware that he had made one himself. Outside of his mind, and outside of his thoughts, his body had taken over and it felt so... good. And wrong.

But, he vaguely realized, _he_ didn't mind _that_.

The words were forming in his mouth before he had time to think about them or what they meant, and then he spoke:

"Now, you're going to regret _me_."

* * *

**3 Years, 5 Months Later**

 

Sherlock stared at his computer screen, his stomach dropping as though he were falling from a rooftop in to oblivion.

He sat back in his chair and brought his hands up against his face almost as though to pray, and his eyelids fluttered shut. He hadn't been aware of the tears that had been filling up in his eyes until he felt them fall down his cheeks in unison. His eyelids snapped back open and he pressed his thumbs against his face quickly to dry the liquid from his skin.

Yes, it felt as though the world were dropping out from underneath his feet again even as an unmovable force rushed up to meet him, and that if he reached out that his hands would connect with nothing but air, nothing but emptiness, nothing but... nothing.

Nothing is what awaited him on the other side of this fall.

After all... he would know.

  **...**

**TBC**

 

 

 


	13. Regret

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello!
> 
> I just wanted to thank all of the supporters, readers, and commenters of this story! It's been quite a while between updates, but I'm still pretty obsessed with this story. I have some one shots and "Stay" coming along as well, but I recently started a new job and I've never been this busy in my life. Updates will be farther between, but they're always coming. I hope this installment isn't a let down after such a long wait, because it was just as much fun to write as always! 
> 
> Thank you so much for your time and your support!

**Come Attrition, Come Hell**

**Chapter 13: Regret**

**...**

 

There had been events, from time to time, in which Sherlock had been surprised by his own behavior. Events such as the night in his bedroom years ago when Irene Adler had turned up unexpectedly expected, when he gave her his body in a passionate, yet quite uncharacteristic, show of affection. Yet even that, really, had not remained much of a surprise to him in the long term. In fact, when he really thought about it, having sex had probably always been an eventuality for him. He doubted that he would have left that stone unturned his whole life if for no other reason than the experience would likely have held some useful information on human behavior.

And indeed it had.

So, no, sex had never been something that had occurred to him as an impossibility.

There were other things, however, that Sherlock had absolutely known with certainty that he would _never_ do. He knew, for instance, that he would never achieve flight with his own arms. Someone else's arms, possibly, but impossibly with his. He also knew that he would never drink another cup of coffee from a particular cafe on the other end of the city, as it had stretched the limits of what could strictly be _called_ coffee - and, while possibly somewhere on the spectrum of personality disorders, he was, at the very least, not masochistic.  And while on the subject, he knew he'd never drink tea or eat chips there again, either. He _knew_ these things.

But then... He had known, too, with all the self-assurance of the blind faithful, that he would never fall in love.

Love had always been an impossible, unreachable, alternate reality. It wasn't that it wouldn't happen to him - but that it couldn't. Much the same way that a man could never hope to flap his arms fast enough or wide enough to fly, Sherlock could never fathom the possibility that he would one day feel that horrible menacing liability people seemed to hold so dear to them. This had been as true for him as was the gravity that kept his feet planted to the London soil beneath him.

That he had been so terribly wrong, of course, was still quite baffling to him.

Now, though - actually for the last several minutes, Sherlock found himself being proven wrong again. Though there was calm and easy reason behind it and he was approaching the situation with clinical detachment, he couldn't help but note, as a pair of eyes watched him with as yet unplaced recognition from behind a counter, that he was about to do another thing that had heretofore always occurred to him as something he would never, ever do.

"What do you think of this one, sir?" The salesman asked as he pulled out a round solitaire diamond embedded in a band of white gold.  
  
Sherlock raked his eyes over the stone. What did he think? A lot of things - but very few of them were about this ring. A wayward thought or two extended in to the realm of wondering, vaguely, if The Woman would have liked it... but he had concluded almost immediately that she would not have.

He stood up straight, looking the jeweler in the eyes and resolving to think no more of ridiculous ideas that could only hurt him.

"Proposals are interesting, aren't they?" He asked, narrowing his eyes just a bit, gesturing slightly toward the ring. "Every day, men are fooled in to participating in a completely manufactured rite of so called eternal affection simply because their girlfriends have been systematically convinced of the value of a stone that is, essentially, worthless."

The man frowned a bit, drooping the ring in his hand.

"...We offer a fair guarantee on every piece we sell."  
  
Sherlock looked back down at the ring.

"Nothing's guaranteed." He responded curtly.

"... Er, well, what about this one?" 

The man brought another ring up from the glass case. This one was a sapphire surrounded by a halo of diamonds - ostentatious and familiar somehow, though he didn't quite know why.  
  
"This one's quite popular, as you might imagine." The clerk continued. A beat. "You know... with the royalty fans."  
  
Sherlock blinked pointedly.  
  
"Do I look particularly invested in the royal family?" He asked monotonously.  
  
"Well..." The man cleared his throat. "No, I suppose not. But I--"

It was at about that moment that a glinting object caught Sherlock's eye. A dazzling pear shaped stone set in a platinum band that was studded with smaller diamonds around the perimeter. This was familiar, too, but in a much different way.

He could see it in his mind even now. Even though it was years later, lifetimes later - through all the pain and all the awful choices, he could remember a pear shaped stone on The Woman's finger. It hadn't been there in Karachi, but in every version of Irene Adler that haunted him - in his dreams, in his mind palace, in his empty hopes - she still wore the jewel on her right hand.  

And upon seeing such a similar piece now, his heart, very simply, broke.

"I'd like that one." He said suddenly, interrupting the other man, pointing to The Ring in question.

The salesman stopped mid-sentence, looking over where Sherlock pointed, and then looked back at him seemingly confused.

"...You'd like to see it?"

"I've already seen it. It's in a clear case."

The man still didn't seem to understand.

"You want to... purchase it?"

"Yes. You give me the ring, and I give you money. Do I really need to explain how this works?"

The man's eyes widened as though in realization.

"Wait a tic, I know you!" He said excitedly. "You're - ugh, what's your name--"  
  
"Oh, for God's sake." Sherlock said with an impatient roll of his eyes.  
  
"--The famous detective! With the hat." He looked around a bit. "Where's your hat?"

Sherlock pointedly said nothing, but the man went on unfettered.

"I can't bloody believe this! The famous hat detective in my shop! Who's the lucky lady?" 

Sherlock stared at the man silently for a moment. There was no lucky lady. Irene had not been lucky before, and Janine was not lucky now. He'd hurt every woman who had ever cared about him; not even Molly Hooper had been immune to his particular brand of "luck". They were, all of them, unfortunate stepping-stones - pieces in the ever-continuing game that was his life.

"Seeing as how you know who I am, I'm sure you understand that your discretion in this matter is of the utmost importance." 

The man's face took on a serious countenance.

"Oh, yes, yes! Of course." He paused for a moment. "But you must know, you won't be able to keep this away from the press for very long.

Sherlock laughed shortly with no warmth.  
  
"No, I don't imagine I will." He said.

But it hardly mattered. The engagement would be over as soon as it started, and he'd be back to being alone the way God, or the universe, or nothing at all, had intended.

Another open and shut case.

* * *

  **1 week earlier**

 

Sherlock lay in bed staring up at the ceiling, his body from the waist down covered only with his thin cream sheet - the blanket in a heap on the floor. He tapped his fingers lightly across his bare stomach, his eyes narrowing and widening in turn as thoughts made their way in and around his mind.

"You do that a lot." Janine said with a smile in her voice, her cheek pressed against a pillow as she looked over at Sherlock.

He stilled as though startled, for, indeed, he had somewhat forgotten that she was still there, and then relaxed a half second later.

"Hm?" He asked.

Janine reached over and tapped lightly across Sherlock's abdomen. His eyes followed her fingers' movements for a few moments until she stopped and settled her hand underneath her pillow, propping her head up just a bit.

Sherlock attempted to will away the small bumps that had spread across his body at her cold touch, but he supposed he was as susceptible to temperature as any other man.

"Helps me to think." He responded quietly.

"You do that a lot, too."

He said nothing. He was not in a conversing mood, truth be told... Though, honestly, he never really was during these sleepovers that Janine seemed to like so much.  He didn't understand, either, what she got out of them. He tried as best as he could to keep a veneer up, to be the kind of man, on the surface, that could have been with a woman like Janine... but still, he knew, he couldn't have been very much fun to be around at night. He had nothing much to offer her in the way of intimacy, and one could only fake that so far before it became glaringly obvious that it was being deliberately avoided.

"-- in love?"

She'd asked him a question, but he had become so lost in thought that he wasn't sure what it had been... 

"What?" He responded with a furrowed brow, the word love hanging in the air.  
  
"Have you ever been in love?" She repeated her question.

Sherlock's face softened in thought as he mulled over the situation and his response.

Really, he had to commend himself on his current circumstance. Admittedly, he wasn't all together comfortable with Janine here in his bed... but she _was_ here, and that had taken a fair amount of rather artful deception on his part. She was here and she liked him. She _actually_ liked him. That was an accomplishment in and of itself, and it had resulted from a controlled and calculated sculpting of his character for her benefit. He had to be a different man while still being himself; nearly equal parts Sherlock as "boyfriend material".... And that was because a pure lie was hard to maintain.  There had to be some truth. There had to be glimpses of the man she knew he was interspersed with glimpses of the man she wanted him to be.

So, sometimes, when he could afford it, he would tell her whole truths. He'd give her real pieces of himself... because the truth was always easier.

Except for in this case, of course, but it was one of the only times "Sherlock" and "boyfriend material" happened to be the same thing... And he could afford this now. In a dark room with the windows closed and with no one but The Wrong Woman around to listen, he could say it.

A beat.

"Yes," he answered finally.

"...Anyone I know?" She asked, a hint of undisguised jealousy in her voice.

He paused again. Irene Adler had been something of a... socialite when she'd lived in London. It was possible that Janine had heard her name at some point, especially working for Magnussen. 

"No."   
  
"What was she like?"  
  
_Was._

Sherlock's heart contracted and he closed his eyes.

"I barely knew her." He responded, recalling his brother's words the night he had offered him the cigarette in the wake of Irene's apparent death, and then opened his eyes again.

"How could you love someone you didn't know?"

Sherlock pressed his lips together for a moment, feeling desperately offended at the question.

"I could _only_ love someone I didn't know," he answered, an irritated sigh creeping in to his words. "Because I _know_ everyone. I _see_ everything. Nothing is secret. Nothing is a mystery. Everything is right there for me to read, and it's tedious."

 _Boring?_ _  
_

Silence.

Sherlock rolled his teeth over each other, knowing that he should not have said that to her, knowing that it hadn't been the right thing at all... but the words had come out as acidic as they were honest, and he hadn't been able to stop them. Though it occurred to him now that he had just expressed a sentiment that may have put a grin on Jim Moriarty's face, and that realization bothered him more than the similarity to the late psychopath had.

He wasn't sure what that meant. He wasn't even sure it mattered.

"Do you see me?" Janine asked quietly.  
  
Sherlock swallowed. This was the part where he had to lie.  
  
He turned to look at her, gently moving his fingers over her cheek for only a second.  
  
"You see me."

Janine closed her eyes as though in relief, and then opened them again to meet Sherlock's.

"You're...." She took a deep breath, seeming to search for the right words. "Not like other men."

"Having met other men, I'll take that as a compliment."

Janine smiled, but then the smile slowly drifted away.

"So, what happened to her?"  
  
He could have asked "who?", but saw no point in playing stupid or prolonging the conversation any further. The real trouble was that he didn't know right away how to respond. He wasn't sure where Irene was, and he didn't know what she was doing. There was so little chance that he would ever see or hear from her again, that he could have answered honestly with "I don't know."  
  
But he didn't.  
  
"She's dead." He said quietly... because, for all intents and purposes, it was just as honest.

* * *

 

**3 Years Earlier**

 

Sherlock could feel Moriarty's eyes on him as soon as the other man was thrown in to the cell along side him. He kept his gaze forward for a moment, keeping his face neutral and his hands steady. He had known this would happen if the judge had decided to hold him in contempt - had known it before he had even been asked to speak at the trial, because _of course_ he was going to be asked to speak at the trial. All he had to be was himself - quite in line with John's warnings. It was the easiest way to get a few moments alone with Moriarty - the easiest way to ascertain his motives.

After all, Mycroft had hardly just let Jim Moriarty go when he performed his little stunt at the Tower. He wanted to be here, that much was clear. Sherlock knew that this was only the beginning of the plan that Mycroft and himself had set in to motion months ago... but the fact that he still understood so little about the man now occupying this small bare cell with him was unnerving. The whole truth was that The Holmes Brothers' plans to reign in the genius psychopath and his network could never have been fool proof enough. The unwilling participant always held the other end of the rope, and there was no telling what he had it anchored to.

"You were very good." Moriarty said in a singsong that suggested he knew more than Sherlock could possibly have been aware of - indeed, that he knew everything there was to know. Even though he was, in some ways, a step ahead of him, Sherlock couldn't help but feel that he was missing something.   
  
Which, in itself, made him uncomfortable.

"It's easy to be the best in a room where everyone else is an idiot." He responded coldly.

"How true." Moriarty said with a smile. "They're all like children at the zoo, aren't they?... Coming up to tap gleefully on the glass. They don't understand what they're seeing or why or how dangerous it is, only that they want to see it."

"You were found wearing the crown jewels in the Tower of London. I'm fairly certain even the people in that courtroom can come to a relatively damning conclusion from that."

Moriarty laughed slightly.

"A lesser man would count on it... But we're cleverer than that, you and me."

"Are we?"

"Mm." He answered in the affirmative, and then looked around casually. "And people will always try to get in our way, but we know how to move them back out of it..." He looked back at Sherlock. "Don't we?"

"What are you talking about?"

"Irene Adler, for example."  
  
Sherlock felt suddenly as though he had been doused in cold water, and stiffened slightly despite his best efforts.  Out of all the words or names he had expected to hear in this room and in this moment Hers had not been one of them. Of course the thought had crossed his mind that he might be able to find out if his cover up had fooled Moriarty, but he knew, realistically, that he couldn't just _ask_.

"I admit when you let her go I thought it an interesting development, a real sign of weakness..." Moriarty went on. "But then you went and let her have her head cropped off, and I'm having a tad hard of a time believing that was out of regard or respect." He finished with a lighthearted laugh, as though he had just made a joke.

Sherlock almost sighed in relief. So, he believed it then.

He had done what he could to erase Irene's existence from the world and, more importantly, from Moriarty's map - but he couldn't have been sure of his efficiency to that end. The man had been in Mycroft's custody for weeks, and then no word from him at all until all until the break ins - Until "Get Sherlock" had catapulted the detective back in to the spotlight exactly when he'd resolved to lay low for a while. He had been hoping for a bit more time to prepare - to make sure his friends would not be caught in any kind of crossfire. 

There had been no real way of knowing if Moriarty bought the lie in Karachi. But now he knew now, and it was one less thing for him to have to carry on his shoulders across the void with him.

"She knew the risks of getting involved with you." He responded with calculated callousness.

"Yes, but I wonder... did she know the risks of getting involved with you?" He paused. "Do any of them?"

Sherlock raised his head but said nothing, not appreciating the subtle threat, but knowing now was not the time for anger or dramatics. 

"I do love our chats, Sherlock." Moriarty continued. "We'll have to keep them up once this whole trial thing is over."

Sherlock nodded once.

"I'll be sure to come visit you in prison."  
  
One corner of Moriarty's mouth lifted in to a half grin, though his eyes did not smile at all. He backed away slowly to the corner of the cell, and then turned his eyes forward.

Sherlock swallowed, and moved his gaze to entrance of the cell. While he had not gleaned any particularly new insight from this encounter, it had been well worth the trouble. Irene was, if not safe... dead; at least where it mattered.

Now he could focus.

* * *

**3 Years Later**

  
Sherlock stared in to the distance, his computer open in front of him in the now day lit parlor as Mrs. Hudson moved around preparing tea.

"What time did you say they were coming round, dear?" She asked, pouring the steaming liquid in to a cup on the table at the side of his armchair. 

"I don't know." He answered tersely.

"And how long did you say you'll be gone?" She asked, stirring 2 teaspoons of sugar in to the tea the way she knew Sherlock liked it. 

Sherlock looked at her.  
  
"Indefinitely. Do you listen when people talk to you, Mrs. Hudson, or do you just cease to exist while words are coming out of someone else's mouth?" He looked away. "We should submit you for study."  
  
"That's a bit funny coming from you." She said with a good-natured smile, standing to her full height having finished with the tea.  
  
"I don't have to listen to people when they speak. They tell me more when they're quiet."  
  
Mrs. Hudson sat down in John's old chair and looked around.  
  
"Well, there will plenty quiet in this old flat now you're leaving again." She paused. "At least I have warning this time."

Sherlock creased his forehead. _This_ time. Because there had been other times, and if this were not the final time, he had little doubt that there would be still more times to come.

He turned completely to look at his landlord. Mrs. Hudson whom had taken care of him in an almost motherly way for years now. She had always been there, always a loyal friend and one of the few people he'd have given his life for. He really was leaving her now.

"Forgive me." He said nearly without thinking.   
  
The older woman looked at him, gentle surprise registering on her face.

Sherlock looked down, took in a breath, and a small smile crept across his mouth.  
  
"I can't have been an easy tenant," he said, looking back up.

"No." She responded with a laugh and a small shake of her head. "You've been rubbish, quite frankly."

"I believe that is the general consensus, yes."

A warm smile spread over Mrs. Hudson's face as she tilted her head downward.

"Sherlock..." She said, shaking her head slightly as though he didn't understand something, another very small laugh escaping her.

Sherlock's eyebrows knit together in confusion.

"What?" He asked.

"You still think people hate you."

Sherlock felt his face softening as he looked upon the woman before him.  
  
"I think people don't understand me, and that people generally don't like what they don't understand."

"Dear... I don't know what you've done, and I don't know where you're going, but I think you're a brilliant and good man... And in the end, that's how I believe everyone else sees you, too. I really and truly believe it."

Mycroft had said as much almost a week earlier. It was almost enough to make him believe it himself.

Almost.

It was true that he was brilliant, he had known it since he was young... But he did occasionally wonder if his brilliance was only relative to those around him. Mycroft had clearly always been cleverer - always just one step ahead. Even when he thought he'd outsmarted him, as was the case with Irene Adler and her supposed death, Mycroft knew. Of course he knew.

So how brilliant was he, really... Why hadn't he been able to figure a way out of this mess that didn't involve his permanent removal from everything he loved?

As for being a good man? He begrudgingly appreciated the sentiment, but it was terribly misplaced in him. He wasn't a good man. If ever he had aspired to be one, he no longer did now. There seemed very little point in it. What was a good man, really? If it was just a man who did good things for whatever myriad of reasons, regardless of intention, then he'd always been one and it had never made any bit of difference in public opinion toward him anyway.

"Well," Mrs. Hudson said as she stood up. "You enjoy your cuppa." 

She turned to go.

Sherlock wanted to stop her for a moment, as he felt there was more to be said. Or there should have been, at the very least... But he was at a loss. Then the moment was gone, and Mrs. Hudson was gone, and he was alone.

He turned back to his computer.

* * *

 

 

 

**Karachi**

**4 Years Earlier**

 

_"And now you're going to regret me..."_

The weeks and the months of burning repression, of pain and remorse... Of wanting so badly to forget what could never be forgot; the wafts of the right perfume on the wrong person. The wrong text tone alerting him to a message. The periods of time where the lack of a case was crushing and the unfocused noise in his brain was deafening. The empty bed where there had _always_ been emptiness save for one wrong night, but that now _felt_ empty. The constant beating of his own heart, which he would never again forget was burning in his chest.

Her. He regretted her. And yes, he wanted her to feel it, too.

As he lay next to a panting Irene Adler, his mind raced in an attempt to rewrite what had already been written - to think of some path he could have taken months ago that did not lead him here. He could have refused his brother, refused the "anonymous" client, at that ridiculous palace. He could have taken Irene's phone from her safe in Belgravia and hailed for the nearest cab. He could have turned her away the night she showed up in his flat. 

All along the way, he could have done it differently. He could have saved himself, and even her, from this. From _him_... But there had never really been a chance or a choice, and he blamed her as much as he blamed himself... And this was it, wasn't it? The end of everything - of life as he knew it. The moment he was letting himself go, allowing himself to feel every awful emotion he'd always somehow managed to keep at bay. All the pain and hate, all the lust and anger, all the want and repulsion. Love and disdain in one horrible dose.   
  
It had been too long - far too long - since he'd felt this woman's lips upon his, since he'd felt her shudder and contract around him. It'd been far too long since her nails had bit in to his completely deserving skin. Too long, and not long enough. Forever would not have been long enough. She was his ugly - his beautiful - contradiction, and yes, God yes, did he regret her.

She had moaned in to his neck, and he'd closed his eyes to the sound before finding her mouth with his, allowing himself to revel in the velvet feel of her tongue for a few long moments even as he resented her for it. He'd taken her roughly, again and again, and she'd whimpered and gasped - returning every thrust and every tightened grip. She'd accepted his hatred of her, because she knew, somehow she _knew_ , that it came attached with his sentiment for her as well. He had never been able to fool her before, so why would now be any different? 

How long had it been since they'd lost themselves to each other in this bed? Minutes? Hours? Eons?... Had they always somehow been here?  
  
"Jim Moriarty may want to rethink that nickname he has for you." Irene said breathlessly, though not, apparently, callously.    
  
She went to caress his cheek, but Sherlock waved her hand off and sat up abruptly so that his legs hung over the side of the bed. He hadn't appreciated the reminder of that night, or the very real possibility that Moriarty had chosen that nickname specifically to pique Irene's interest in him. Of course she'd feel a smug sense of victory in the idea that she, and only she, could bring the heartless and calculating Sherlock Holmes to his knees.

"You should get dressed." He said curtly, inclining his head only slightly toward her. "I don't believe anyone saw us in the corridor, but if they did it brought us a lot more attention than we need."

He could hear Irene swallow, but when she spoke it was as calm as though they hadn't just spent the better part of the night passionately entwined in each other.

"We're leaving now?" She asked.

"I don't see any reason why we should stay," he responded distractedly, looking through the itinerary on his phone that had previously lain forgotten on the nightstand, and doing his best to focus on anything other than The Woman behind him. "I was going to let you sleep, but since that inclination seems to have failed you, we may as well get a head start. I've set up an email for you should you ever find yourself about to be more dead than you'd like to be again, as texting is about as secure as yelling your name out from a window."

He stood at that and began collecting his clothes, refusing to recall the way Irene's warm hands had felt over his body that was now cooling in the air of the hotel room. 

"Getting dressed increases exponentially in difficulty when you don't move." He said as he pulled his pants and his trousers on.   
  
"Oh, I'm just waiting for you to lay my ensemble out on the bed for me, seeing as how you're so completely in control of the situation." Irene spoke blithely, though bitingly, and Sherlock finally looked at her. There was an intensity in her eyes that he felt altogether disinclined to analyze.  
  
He looked away as he bent to retrieve his shirt from the floor.  
  
"There's a dress on a hanger in the bathroom." He responded dismissively. "I'm sure you saw it when you showered... Not much of a need to lay it out on the bed for you."  
  
A beat.  
  
"Always back to square one with you, isn't it?"  
  
Sherlock buttoned his shirt almost to the top, and then tussled his hair with both hands out of frustration before turning his whole body toward The Woman.  
  
"I came here to ensure that your head didn't end up on a pike on London Bridge as a warning to my fr..." He shook his head, not willing to head down that path of conversation. "You're alive. I went to quite a bit more trouble than I'm used to going through to secure that outcome, let alone for someone I don't particularly like, so--"  
  
"And now you're shuffling me off to a distant mythical land where you can safely categorize me as 'dealt with'... But it's not what you want." She started harshly, standing from the bed, paying no heed at all to her complete state of undress.

Sherlock's gaze shifted away from her to the window. His eyes stared unwaveringly at the drapes as he listened to her speak. He listened to her awful voice and her awful words as the memories of not just the last 24 hours, but of the last 6 months ran through his head. This person had nearly cost him his reputation and his life, and had irrevocably cost him his peace of mind and sense of self, and he knew in this moment that he didn't want this. He didn't want any of this. There was nothing missing in his life before he met Irene. He was fine. He was alone and he was fine. Now there was a gaping woman shaped hole right through the center of him, and he wanted done with it.

"Who you were before is not who you are now." She continued. "Why can't you let go of that idea of yourself? I'm right here, Sherlock, but you're too much of a coward to accept what's right in front of you. Too much of a coward to admit that Sherlock Holmes has actually fallen in--"

"I _don't_ love you." He interrupted her roughly, asserting again what he had been telling her all along. "How many times do I have to say it? If you spared a thought outside of your own pathetic sentiment, you'd realize I _despise_ you."

The Woman was stunned silent, whatever other words she was about to say dying on her tongue. Sherlock crossed the room to where she was standing behind the bed and imposed his height over hers, her gaze meeting his defiantly even as she craned her neck back to meet his eyes.

Sherlock went on.

"You're just one woman who fancies herself the cleverest in the room, a step ahead of everyone else, but let me make something perfectly clear to you, Ms. Adler... It's not true. Not for you, and not for me. Neither of us is special.  We are, both of us, _damaged and delusional_... And you're far too much like me for me to love you."

It was simultaneously the truest and the most false thing he had ever said aloud.

"Emotions don't work like that." Irene said quietly.

"All right." Sherlock started with a short and rueful laugh as he briefly cocked his neck as though to stretch the muscle, frustrated words bubbling from the tip of his tongue. "Let's have a lesson in emotion from the second least qualified person on the planet. Tell me, then. How do emotions work? Since you've always been in such marvelous control over yours? Tell me of your triumph of will and spirit and how love has enriched your life beyond words or measurement."

Irene didn't respond, though her face had lost that look of defiance, and in its place was now bewilderment. Sherlock wanted to be the kind of man that the expression on her face would have deterred, but he found now that he wasn't. That he never had been, and that maybe he never would be.

"No?" He asked sarcastically at her silence. "Nothing? Is it perhaps because the only thing love has ever done for you is put you in the situation you now find yourself? Or is it because you're a sociopath, Irene, just like me? Ready to do anything if it suits your purposes. Ready to sell your country to the highest bidder and destroy the object of your unfortunate affections at the first available opportunity--"

"Stop." Irene said firmly.

Sherlock blinked rapidly, pressing his mouth in to a tight line. Somewhere deep down, penetrating through the thick fog of his anger, he was relieved that she hadn't allowed him to go on.

There were a few moments of ringing silence, and then:

"I love you." She said, and there was no uncertainty in her voice. She sounded calm, as though remarking on the state of the weather.

Sherlock could sense his mind palace going in to complete lock down in response before the words even registered. Doors were slamming shut, blinds were swirling closed, and only one sentence was available to him for the taking.

"It doesn't matter." He said monotonously, and the numbness was all encompassing. He felt nothing. Not sadness or regret. Not aching or longing. Not even anger.

He'd loved her an hour before, he was sure of it, but now the woman shaped hole inside of him seemed to have caved in on itself, and he was just... exhausted.

"Of course." Irene said almost matter-of-factly, but there was an underlying tone of surprise that almost penetrated through the anesthetic fog that surrounded him.

Sherlock swallowed, working his jaw as though grinding his teeth. There were words that needed to be said now, he knew, but the air was heavy and thick and he didn't have the energy to speak them.

"Why did you come?" Irene asked after a moment, her eyes narrowing. "Why did you really come?"

Sherlock took a step back.

"Because I owed you this." Was the answer that came from his mouth, though the sentence didn't quite connect with the odd dropping sensation in his stomach.

"Then why the email? You don't owe me anything more."

He paused for a moment.

"I feel, Ms Adler, that you are a debt I have taken on for the remainder of my life."

There was more that he could say. He could say that he felt obligated to keep her safe considering why she was on the run to begin with. He could say that he willingly accepted his debt to her because she was a perfect reminder of what could happen if he relented to his own sentiment... He could tell her it was a punishment he felt he deserved. But he didn't say any of it. He stopped talking then, as he realized anything more would be needlessly cruel... And he didn't see the point in it.

"Well." Irene sighed carelessly. "You really know how to make a girl feel special."

Sherlock swallowed.

"You knew who I was." He responded simply, and then after a moment added: "You know who I am."

She didn't look hurt. She didn't look upset. She looked... blank.

"...Then I suppose there's nothing more to say." Irene said evenly.

Sherlock nodded once, shallowly, and in agreement. The truth was that he knew, deep down inside of the place in his mind palace where his long deceased dog's collar rested on a mantel and where John's cane hung on a hook, that Irene admitting she loved him was the most significant moment of his existence, and that the numbness was only a form of shock to help him cope with the feeling of immense agonizing joy he just didn't know what to do with... But he was Sherlock Holmes, just as she said, and that feeling that was now buried so deep inside of him that he could almost imagine it didn't exist was precisely the reason that there was no place for this woman in his life.

Even if she'd actually meant those 3 unimaginable words that she'd spoken... He wouldn't give up who he was for her.

Irene walked past Sherlock to the bathroom where the dress he had provided her with hung, and he didn't move. Just as she had made him hate her in the end that night in his bedroom so that it was easier for her to leave him when she had to, so had he just done to her.

He'd wanted her to regret him, after all... And now he was sure she would.

* * *

**4 Years Later**

_I won't go in to the details, for several reasons, not the least of which being I am on something of a time limit, but also because you were there. If I speak of regret, I have no doubt that you understand to what I am referring._

_A_ _nd it doesn't matter. I can't wave my hand and make it so that it never happened or so that the words were never said._

_Only one thing matters now. I want you to know that you've never left me since that night in my bedroom. You were with me when I fell. You were with me when I was dying, and you were with me when I was dead. Through everything, you've been there, whispering, saying hello, saying goodnight, saying goodbye. You're with me now. You'll be with me when I'm gone. I believe there is a poem that expresses this sentiment in far greater detail and eloquence than I ever could, so I'll leave the overly sentimental prose to the poet... But I want you to know, at least, that I mean it._

_Though now, I have only one favor to ask of you. The first and the last._

_All I ask is that you do not carry me with you the way that I have carried you with me. Ms Adler, that is one thing I would not wish on anyone - least of all the person who has earned the unfortunate distinction of being the only woman I have ever loved._

_All I ask is that you let me go._

 

**...TBC...**


	14. Attrition

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello there, and welcome back! 
> 
> When I was writing this, I thought that I was writing the last chapter of "Come Attrition," but as I wrote I realized there was too much to be summed up in one go... So, I have one more chapter of this story in me. It's a weird thing to find myself coming to the end of this undertaking that's been part of my life for over a year now. I'm also getting quite nervous, because they say you're supposed to leave your audience wanting more, and I can only hope that I will have accomplished something to that effect in the end.
> 
> As for this chapter in particular, a few things occurred to me while writing it. I've seen The Abominable Bride quite a few times now, and have tried my best to incorporate the themes and new bits of information we were given, because my intention with this story was always to write, at least technically, within the confines of canon... But I've finally accepted the idea that there will be some things that I just get wrong - not just with the upcoming plot, but also with my characterizations. I've tried really hard to keep my version of these characters consistent and authentic, but with this new installment I decided to give myself a bit of a freer rein. I don't know if it will be noticeable or not, but I thought it was worth noting!
> 
> Anyway, this story has meant quite a lot to me, and I do really hope that it's touched someone's life in some way or added some fuel for thought as to these characters and their motivations. I can't tell you how much I've appreciated every comment and tumblr post, and every person who's given any kind of a crap about this story.
> 
> Aaaaaand I'm rambling. I hope you enjoy this chapter; it's long, but hopefully not tedious. Thank you so much for reading!

**Come Attrition, Come Hell**

**Chapter 14: Attrition**

**...**  
  


**England, 1 January 2015**

**Solitary Confinement**

Sherlock lay with his eyes turned up to the ceiling, recalling the many, many times he had done this before in other more pleasant, or at least tolerable, circumstances. His hands lay folded across the clasped jacket button at his ribcage, and save for the slow inhale and exhale of his lungs, his body was almost completely motionless. Looking in on him, one may have guessed that he was dead.

And wasn't he?  
  
The solitary cell was a small enclosed space with nothing but a sink and toilet, and the rigid bed that he now found himself resigned to. The overhead light remained constantly on for 16 hours, and then off for 8, and his food came to him through a voiceless slot in the windowless door 3 times a day. Lunch came with tea and biscuits which, he felt, was his brother's doing; a gesture that, as Mycroft would have calculated, went wholly to waste. Indeed, all that Sherlock took from these meals was the accompanying glass of water.  
  
In 30 minutes the light would come back on and, along with heralding daybreak, would mark the 6th day that Sherlock had not eaten.

On the first day he spent about an hour gathering what information he could about the previous occupant of the cell: it'd been a stout man with dark black hair, likely with diabetes, and vaguely illiterate. That, though, hadn't been particularly diverting and he had found quite early on that if he didn't find something to pass the time with that he'd probably end up going mad. So, by the 2nd day he'd solved the decades old Carmichael murder, by the 3rd he was convinced he knew who Jack the Ripper had been, by the 4th he had moved on to solving Rubik’s cube puzzles in his head, and on the 5th day he'd started to go mad anyway. Now, however, he'd stopped solving crimes and Rubik's cubes, and had started to try and solve his own problem: the problem he'd rather tried to avoid thinking about at first - the only problem that mattered, though it didn't matter at all.

How could he possibly protect John and Mary without killing Magnussen?

In his mind, he'd walked back inside of the posh key card protected loft that he’d broken in to by way of an unmeant proposal, and looked around. He sniffed the air, and immediately recollected the smell of Mary Watson's perfume. Yes, that was an answer, wasn't it? If he'd only let Mary do what she'd set out to do in the first place, Magnussen would still be dead and everyone he loved would still be safe. Of course, he couldn't have known who Mary was before that night (or if he could have, he had not been clever enough to see it), and so it happened in the only way it could have happened.

How then? _How_? How could he have got everyone out of this alive without succumbing to a solution that didn't burst out from the barrel of a gun? He'd never been averse to fighting or to violence when it was necessary... but this? He'd thrown his whole life away with both hands clenched around a promise. A vow.

In the end, he wasn't... good enough. In the end, Magnussen had beaten him.

Sherlock lifted his head abruptly.

"Oh, it's you." He said wearily to The Woman who stood before him, blocking the view of the cell door. She wasn't as he usually imagined her - neither naked nor wearing his coat. She appeared to his subconscious now in a simple black dress with her hair down and spread across her shoulders. This was a version of her he didn't feel that he had any claim on or association with, and why he should be imagining her this way, or at this moment at all, was a mystery to him. "What do you want?"

Irene crossed her arms and smiled.

"You tell me."

He dropped his head back down to the pillow, and resumed staring at the ceiling.

"Get out of my head," he said. "I need to be alone."

She nodded.

"You are alone."

He sat up, throwing his legs over the side of the bed and gripping the edges with his hands as he leaned forward.

"Yes, so why you? Why _now_?" He shook his head, gesturing once sharply at her with his right hand. "I know you're safe. I can't do anything more for you, and I actually have more important things to haunt myself with now."

"But you can't forget me."

Sherlock pressed his head in to the heels of his palms momentarily, before returning them to the bed.

"That's become relatively obvious to me over the years, thank you."

"Mrs. Hudson, Molly, Lestrade... John. What about me?"

He furrowed his forehead in irritation.

"What about you?"

"Why didn't you call me when Mycroft gave you the chance? It would have been so easy."

"I have nothing more to say to you."

"Not even goodbye?"

"Oh, for God's sake, what _good_ is a goodbye?"

"Sherlock..."

"Why can't I make you disappear?" He stood suddenly and took one step closer to the apparition, but then stayed rooted. "You beat me. I'm _beaten_. I could never calculate my way out of you, and I can't calculate my way out of this. I've failed - I've _hurt_ -everyone who's ever cared for me. I am neither a good man nor am I a great one. Everything I've always believed I was, that my friends believed I was, could not _possibly_ reflect the reality now."

"You're afraid."  
  
Sherlock rotated his jaw and bit the inside of his lip while momentarily looking to the ground before focusing back on The Woman who wasn't really in the room with him.

"You're here to tell me something, obviously, and it can't be that I'm afraid."  
  
"Why not?"  
  
A beat.  
  
"Because I already knew that."

"Oh, come on, Sherlock..." A new, lilting Irish voice sounded softly from the corner opposite his bed.

Sherlock turned his head immediately to the direction it came from, and narrowed his eyes at the sight of a man in a dark suit and slicked back hair, leaning against the wall with his hands in his trouser pockets.

"So good of you to join us." Sherlock said monotonously.

Moriarty grinned.

"Why don't you tell her the truth? Why don't you tell us _all_ the truth?"

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"You're a bad man." Moriarty intoned in a singsong that sent chills down Sherlock's spine even though the voice and the man were imagined.

No, not imagined. Remembered.

"You lied, Sherlock... and you cheated. Oh, and _how_ you cheated!" He said almost reverently, pushing himself away from the wall with his foot and pulling his hands out of his pockets to clap slowly, 3 times. "Shooting someone in the head just to get your way? Imagine what we could have accomplished together."

_I see. You’re not ordinary. No. You’re me. You’re me. Thank you... Sherlock Holmes._

"I'm not you." Sherlock bit out. "You're insane."  
  
"No..." Moriarty shook his head slowly. "I'm not insane. I'm dead. That means _you're_ insane."

Sherlock turned his gaze to where Irene would have been sitting if she were really here.

"And you?" He asked. "I suppose you have something to add."

Irene met his gaze almost knowingly.

"You're _afraid_."  
  
"Yes, you said that--"

"You want to believe those pretty things that Big Brother said about you," Moriarty spoke from behind him, and he reeled back around to see that they were now face to face. "But deep down, when there's no one around but the dead and the missing, when you're all alone without John's blog or your little fan club... You know he's wrong. In the end, you know you're just. Like. Me."

"I am _me_."

"And we are all together."

Sherlock closed his eyes hard for a moment.

"No." He said, opening them back on his dead tormenter.

"See how they fly?" Moriarty continued, taking his hand and raising it high only to plummet it down an imaginary slope.

_Falling's a lot like flying, Sherlock... Except there's a more permanent destination._

He remembered the words. He remembered the fall.

He opened his eyes on Irene, a loud and almost unbearable ringing building in his ears becoming louder and louder for a few moments.

"I'm broken." He said simply, and the ringing stopped.

And with that Moriarty was gone. Only Irene remained.

"We might have been happy." She said simply.

"We never would have been happy."

"And now you're a murderer... You're punishing yourself with me, and you're punishing me for loving you. After all this time."

Sherlock had nothing to say in response, and so he _said_ nothing.

"You know I'll wonder about you for the rest of my life if you just disappear. I'll carry you with me wherever I am if you don't give me a chance to let you go."

Sherlock looked to the corner where the specter of Moriarty had just stood.

"Time will pass." He said. "It always does. With enough time anything can be forgot; Any hurt healed."

"Really." She said incredulously. "And how is that working out for you?"

He turned back suddenly to look at her, but she was gone.

The lights came on, and a moment later the cell door opened.

Sherlock, who hadn't actually moved, as the interactions he had just experienced had not actually happened, still lay in his cell bed staring up at the ceiling, just as he had been doing all night. He looked toward the open door to see who stood in the doorway

It was Mycroft.

"Good morning, brother of mine." He said. "If you've come for tea, I'm afraid I'm all out."

Mycroft paused before speaking; seemingly taking in the sight of Sherlock sprawled out on his prison bed.

"I'm told you haven't been eating."

"I've been working."

"On?"

Sherlock sat up, placing his shoed feet on the floor - his arms rigid at his sides, turning his head almost elegantly, maybe more like mechanically, toward his brother.

"What are you doing here, anyway? Aren't I supposed to be left here to contemplate my many sins in solitude?"

"You say that as though that's not exactly what you've been doing for 6 days."

Sherlock sat a little straighter, his face hardening, but did not respond.

"And anyway, the confinement is more for your protection than for your punishment, and I've come to tell you that I've secured you a reprieve of sorts."

"Of sorts?" He asked, cocking his head just slightly in confusion.

"I've negotiated for you to spend your last night at Baker Street."

Sherlock felt the first stirring of something like relief that he'd experienced in days. It struck inside of his chest like a match, burned bright for a moment, and then faded away almost as though it hadn't been there at all, leaving behind only a vague trail of smoke that allowed him, at least, something to look forward to.  
  
"On what terms?" He inquired in a formal tone.  
  
"On the terms that you leave for your assignment tomorrow morning."  
  
"My assignment." He scoffed.

"Do you accept?"  
  
"Of course I accept." Sherlock nearly sneered. "What does it matter to me whether I leave tomorrow morning, or two months from now?"

Mycroft was silent for a moment.  
  
"I'll relay the message." He spoke finally. "They'll perform a sweep of your flat before you can be allowed back, of course."

"Naturally."  
  
Mycroft pointedly did not turn to go.  
  
"Was there something else?" Sherlock asked impatiently. "I _was_ in the middle of something."

"Ah, yes. You were working. Care to elaborate?"

Sherlock stared at his brother, his eyes sparking but his face blank. He didn't answer.

"I'll leave you to it, then." Mycroft said after a moment, a hint of what was most obviously, and tellingly, sadness in his voice. "I'll have someone round to escort you to your flat in a few hours."

Suddenly Sherlock stood.

"I'll need access to a computer."  
  
"A computer?"  
  
"Yes. I need to send out an email."  
  
"And may I inquire as to whom?"

Sherlock exhaled, his gaze wavering just slightly.  
  
"You may inquire... But they tell me you're the cleverer brother, so I would think you wouldn't need to."

A long moment of silence passed between the two of them before Mycroft spoke.

"In that case," He started. "You might be interested to know that I've also opened negotiations for Ms Adler's admittance back in to London. If she wishes it, of course."  
  
Sherlock's eyes widened slightly, and his fingers immediately began to twiddle at his sides, feeling his stomach sink in a feeling almost of anticipation.

"You've been in contact with her, then?"  
  
"Not me personally, no. I didn't see the necessity for that."  
  
"And has she been informed as to the origin of her pending pardon?" He asked, only making a halfhearted attempt at hiding the urgency from his voice. It was so near the end now that he was beginning to feel that there was no more need of half-truths and secrecy, at least not with his brother.

"Not at all." Mycroft answered, raising his head. "Though it'd scarcely be a difficult deduction. Don't you think?"

 Sherlock's gaze dropped completely as he contemplated the meaning and implication of his brother's words. It was true... A government pardon after all these years, and with the email that Sherlock was now determined to send, it wasn't a reasonable expectation to assume Irene would not figure that Sherlock had somehow been behind it. He didn't want to her to know, because he didn't want her to feel any lingering sense of gratitude or, worse, a suspicion that it had been done out of guilt... But he couldn't keep the truth from her if it was there to see.  
  
"Sherlock." Mycroft went on. Sherlock looked up. "I'm sure I don't need to say this--"  
  
"Then don't."  
  
"--But Irene Adler is one of the most significant examples of British treason to emerge in the last half century, and you are, for whatever reason, a detective. To regret that a relationship was never possible between the two of you would be to regret who you are."  
  
"Yes." Sherlock agreed without preamble or qualification.  
  
"And do you?"  
  
Sherlock took a deep breath. He regretted his current circumstance, and he regretted the outcome of certain of his choices... but did he regret who he was?  
  
"No." He spoke the word definitively. "And to allay the curiosity you seem to be battling, as far as The Woman is concerned... I never had any delusions as to what was and what was not possible. I could never have settled for any kind of domesticity, and I'd venture to say that, in this case, where I was only unwilling she was even less inclined to a life that would have allowed for..."  
  
He stopped.  
  
"For?"

"Me." Sherlock finished, though he wasn't sure that it was what he was originally going to say.

"Then what could you possibly have to say to her now?"

"The fact that you have to ask is proof enough that you wouldn't understand."  
  
"Indulge me."  
  
"You've never been in love."  
  
"And you have?"  
  
Sherlock's answer was in his pointed silence.  
  
Mycroft let out a sigh as though he'd been holding his breath.  
  
"I see."

"Since it is impossible that I should ever see her again, I would like at least the chance to explain to her why I've been such a miserable bastard to her throughout the whole of our association with each other."

Mycroft's face was grave and an expression of undisguised surprise was registering in his features. He had no doubt guessed as to the extent of Sherlock's emotional attachment to Irene Adler, but there was no possibility of him having conjectured that love was the root of his behavior or requests as far as she was concerned... And later, when Mycroft was alone, even though Sherlock hadn't expressly admitted it, he would probably blame himself for it.

"Yes, well, one can hardly fault you for that." He responded. "She did manipulate you in order to hold the well being of the country ransom for a larger sum of money than the average British Citizen could even speculate exists."

"That was our failure as well as hers, and also not what I'm talking about."

"You've had such little contact with her that I'm afraid I don't see what else you _can_ be talking about."  
  
Sherlock didn't need words to tell his brother that he was wrong on that point, because the evidence was clear on his face and in his eyes.  
  
Mycroft looked down for a moment, and then back up.

"I can arrange another phone call." He spoke in a tone that implied this was as much as he was willing to offer his brother - indeed, that he had already offered too much.  
  
"I don't need a phone call, I need a computer."

"I can't make any guarantees--"  
  
"It will need to be secure."  
  
"Sherlock, you can't possibly believe that I would be able to accomodate you with an unmonitored mode of communica--"  
  
"It is imperative that I--"  
  
"You are being sent away for murder, and she is a traitor - there are limits even to what I--"  
  
"Mycroft-- please, I--"  
  
"What you are asking me--"  
  
"I _love_ her!"  
  
Mycroft Holmes was struck abruptly silent - the words on his lips dying away to nothing. Sherlock, for his part, seemed just as shocked by his open admission (the only one he'd ever voiced aloud to someone who knew who he was talking about) as his brother clearly was... But then he realized it didn't matter. He'd given nothing away that he hadn't been prepared to give, and in the end - and this _was_ the end - he didn't need Mycroft to believe that he was just like him anymore. He'd been unwittingly searching for his validation and approval since they were children, but the reality was that he'd never been _that_ man. He'd known it since Redbeard and had since redoubled his efforts which had resulted in the, admittedly quite interesting, life he had lived thus far... But the life he had lived thus far was over.

He understood now that he wasn't Moriarty, and he wasn't his brother... He was Sherlock Holmes. And Sherlock Holmes, against probability, against reason, against logic, had fallen in love.  
  
There was a piercing silence as the two brothers met each other's eyes unwaveringly - Sherlock with resolve, and Mycroft with pity.

"Then I'm sorry." He said, raising his head. "I'm sorry that I put you in her path."

Sherlock pressed his lips together in a thin line looking down to the side for a moment, just so that he wasn't looking at his brother, before meeting his eyes once more.

The truth was, loving The Woman had been a significant part of his life, and knowing her had changed him, for better or for worse, irrevocably. It'd awaken him to a plain of existence that had had previously occurred to him as intangible and unimaginable as a 5th dimension... She'd made him stronger and weaker in equal turn, and he didn't regret her. Not anymore.  
  
Which, as it turns out, had only just occurred to him at this moment... And if anything, he could only be begrudgingly grateful to his brother for pulling him out of his flat in his bed sheet for a visit to Buckingham Palace that would change his whole world.  
  
"Don't be." He responded, clenching and unclenching his fist in rapid succession at his side. "Just get me a computer."

* * *

**Karachi**

**4 Years Earlier**

  
Sherlock paced back and forth in the hotel room in front of the bed, his fingers clasped and twitching behind him. In the minutes since Irene had gone in to the bathroom to change, he'd become increasingly anxious and agitated... and aware.

 He had to really congratulate himself on this one. He'd hurt people in the past, but it had always been a means to an end. He had always valued honesty over kindness, but this? This had been neither. He'd hurt Irene, and he'd done it on purpose... He'd done it because he was selfish and stubborn and, yes, frightened. More frightened than he knew it was possible for him to be... because usually his fear was accompanied by adrenaline and excitement. The fear now overcoming him was the type a child felt of the abyss underneath his bed, where all he could do was hide and hope for day. The big difference was that the monster under _his_ bed was a woman 2 heads shorter than himself, and whose most frightening attributes were her most beautiful.  
  
Among them: the fact that she loved him.

She l _oved_ him. Or at least she said she did. She _had_ said the words, hadn't she? Or had he imagined it? Had his brain critically malfunctioned at some point this night, or possibly had he somehow fallen asleep? Was he dreaming? Was this all some horrible nightmare where the best thing that ever happened to him was, in reality, the worst thing that ever happened to him?

 _Oh, god..._  
  
He closed his eyes tightly against the memory of her breath in his ear from less than a half an hour before.

 _Sherlock!_  
  
Sherlock opened his eyes and shook his head. He was so close; so close now to having her out of his life forever. In less than a week's time this would all be behind him, and he could lock all of it up in his memory where he never needed to touch it again.

But she had just told him _she loved him,_ and now that she was out of his sight, the numbness of shock was quickly wearing off, and he was becoming acutely conscious of a pulsing pain in his chest that made it hard to think and to breathe. Except, no, it wasn't hard for him to think. It was hard for him to focus, but not to think.

_Stop. I love you._

He'd told her it didn't matter. He'd felt nothing when he said the words, but now the full force of their meaning was hitting him headlong, and he realized he couldn't have been crueler if he had tried.

He bit down hard enough to make his jaw ache ran his hand across his mouth.

Just a few more hours. A few more hours, and The Woman would be gone, and he could go back to this life. Well and _finally_ back to his life.

Just when he felt that he might go insane from the crushing heartache and waves of blinding ambivalence, Irene Adler emerged from the bathroom wearing the simple black dress he had brought along for her.

"Good, it fits." Sherlock said offhandedly, turning his back to her to hide the shaking of his hands as he took his phone from his trouser pocket and stared down at the screen that could tell him nothing more than what he already knew.  
  
"Of course it fits." She responded simply and tonelessly, an implication - as to just exactly _how_ Sherlock knew her dress size - hanging in the air.

"There are some last details to go over, and--"

"Where's your gun?" Irene interrupted him.

Sherlock turned to look at her to find that she was staring at him as blankly as she had been before she left to change, and his face briefly twitched in to an expression of confusion as to why she would ask that. He unbuttoned his jacket and held it open for a moment to reveal the hilt of a gun in his trouser band - silently telling her that if she was thinking of trying something particularly stupid, given that the gun was on his person, she should probably think twice. He let his jacket fall back closed.

"You may want to take some time to go over those..." He said, gesturing toward the pile of documents on the writing table that she must have picked up from the floor while he was downstairs. He looked back down at his phone. "The email I've set up for you is written down, along with instructions on how to access it, and a passcode."

"Passcode." He heard her mutter with a mirthless laugh, and he closed his eyes to the sound for a moment. There was a beat of silence, and then: "Look at me."

Though he kept his head down, he did as she demanded and angled his eyes up at her... because the alternative was to refuse and make plain just how utterly lost and afraid he was.

She bore her eyes in to his, her eyebrows coming together as she seemed to search for something in his face that he could only guess at. She never found what she was looking for when she looked at him this way, and he didn't understand why she bothered. After the words he'd spoken to her tonight, he wasn't even sure how she could look at him at all.

"I know why you keep the photo of your brother in your bedroom," She started, taking a step toward him, and then another. Just as he predicted, it seemed she had not found what she had been looking for in his eyes, and he felt a mixture of relief and disappointment.

"Do you?" He asked darkly with an almost imperceptible half nod of his head, though in inflection it was more of a statement. This night was such a parallel to the only other he'd ever had with this woman, and if he hadn't been so unhappy he might have marveled at it.

"At first I thought it was because you loved him." She shook her head, elegantly crossing her arms one over the other. "But no. Sherlock Holmes doesn't love anybody."  
  
Sherlock could feel his face hardening at those words. This was what it always came to between them. He hurt her, so she had to hurt him in turn. Round and round, nothing new under the sun.

"Bravo." He said sarcastically, either not wishing or not willing to argue the subject. "You've figured me out."

"Then why?" She continued, ignoring his comment. "Why the photo?"  
  
"Sometimes a photo is just a photo."

She lowered her head with a condescendingly pitiful smile.

"And sometimes a camera phone is just a camera phone... But not with us." She took another step toward him. "You're a man who values reason and logic above family or friends," She paused for a moment with an acknowledging nod to her next words: "Or love. A man who believes in everything that makes the world cold--"  
  
"Is there a point you're trying to make, Ms Adler?" He asked exasperatedly.  
  
"Did you ever wonder at why Jim Moriarty called _Mycroft_ The Iceman, and you only got--"  
  
Sherlock pushed passed Irene to the other side of the room where his coat hung on the back of the chair. Picking it up and quickly putting it on, he put his phone in his pocket and ran his hand through his hair, trying to focus on something; trying to find some combination of words that would stop time or at least stop _her_.  
  
"We'll drive only as far as--" He began, but she _wasn't_ to be stopped.

"Mycroft Holmes is everything you aspire to be, but can't quite become." She spoke, raising her voice. He looked back over at her, his lips pressed to a thin red line in the pale pallor of his face, and his collar up around his neck. "He's cleverer than you, colder than you, better than you... You said that the photo was a reminder that you could be beaten, but if that were true then you'd replace it with a picture of me. The photo isn't a reminder, it's a vow."

"I don't make vows." He said in a near rumble of a whisper. "I don't make friends, I don't fall in love, and I don't have to _try_ to be like my brother. If he and I are alike it is not by design, but it is a matter of probability. The majority of the world is petty, stupid, and meandering, and it only takes being _smart_ enough to not want to be a part of it."

"You're just a little boy trying desperately to get out from underneath the shadow of his big brother... And in the end, that's what this is about, too."

"This." He repeated, though he didn't understand quite what she was getting at.  
  
"You coming here. This _rescue_."

 His features knit together in a frown.  
  
"Don't be ridic--"  
  
"Does he know you're here?" She asked with her eyebrows raised.

Sherlock's face softened, and when he didn't answer Irene's smile was knowing and vicious.

"You hate me because I made you look like a fool in front of the one man whose opinion of you matters, and now you're using me to prove to yourself that you're clever enough to stand outside of his reach."  
  
"No..." Sherlock started with a dangerous smile of his own. "If I really wanted to live up to my brother's standard, I would have let you die."

"And did the thought ever cross your mind?"

"The thought of letting you die?" He asked, and then shook his head with a small, blithe shrug. "No... But I _had_ hoped you'd be dead by the time I got here. It would have saved me a lot of trouble."

The effect on Irene's face was immediate, though brief. Her eyes flashed wide for a moment in surprise, but then the mask fell right back over it.

She swallowed.

"I saw you come after me." She said.

Sherlock remained still, but a cold shiver ran through him.

"What are you talking about?"  
  
"The night we spent together on Baker Street, just after I'd left your flat."

He watched as she walked slowly across to him, stopping within inches of his stricken face - looking up in to his eyes she repeated, "I saw you come after me."

Sherlock, mortified that she had witnessed that awful and telling moment, swallowed and pulled his eyes from The Woman to stare straight ahead at the opposite wall.

His defenses were crumbling even as he mentally rushed to repair them in the face of her damning assertion... and he suddenly felt more tired than he ever had in his entire life. That he had chased after her that night was undeniable, and what it meant was unmistakable. What could he say to her now? How could he possibly explain away that action in a way that wouldn't be horribly and noticeably inadequate? He felt powerless, and his broken heart and spirit were coming up from the depths of his icy resolve begging him to take comfort in the one woman who'd ever made him feel human... And if he really were human, maybe he'd break down and admit everything. Maybe he'd take all of his hurtful words back, and maybe she'd forgive him.

Maybe she'd tell him she loved him again.

He closed his eyes.

Irene gently placed her hands on the inside of his coat, running them down the length of his torso, and then whispering her fingers across his hips. She brought her lips close to his, and he no longer had the will to push her away.  
  
"I just wanted you to know that..." She went on. "Before I did this."

And that was when he felt the barrel of his pistol against his neck.

Sherlock's eyes opened and sparked back to life, the haze he'd been wading in suddenly clearing as he looked down at a triumphant Irene Adler.

She "tsked" at him provocatively.  
  
"You can never be too careful with these things." She said, stepping away from him and toward the writing desk, keeping the gun aimed in his direction. "Hands behind that sexy head of yours, please. And _thank you_."  
  
Sherlock did as he was told with something similar to a roll of his eyes.

"What are you doing?" He demanded poisonously.  
  
"Rescuing myself." She responded, taking the documents with her free hand. "You've been a big help, but now, I think, I can take it from here."  
  
"You won't get out of this country alive." Sherlock responded with a shake of his head.

"I made it out of Britain just fine."  
  
"Do you really think you were just captured by a random terrorist cell? Those men were under Moriarty's orders... And there will be more of them. If he finds out you're still alive..."  
  
Irene laughed, and Sherlock left his sentence unfinished in the wake of the sound.  
  
"Moriarty." She repeated. "Something tells me you've taken care of that for me." She paused. "Didn't you, my love?"  
  
He flinched at the endearment - made all the more worse by the fact that she was using it to mock him, and that, yes; he had "taken care of it." Moriarty was in Mycroft's custody at the moment, and when he was released, if all went well, he would believe Irene to be dead. She'd be safe.

"The gun is a little over the top. I think it's a bit unlikely that you'd actually shoot me."  
  
Irene cocked the pistol without a moments' hesitation.  
  
"Then you don't know me."

 _Take that risk._  
  
Sherlock had to concede the point.  
  
"Now," Irene continued, moving cautiously over to him as he followed her with his eyes, and slipping the envelope that contained all she needed to start a new life underneath her arm. "I'll need your wallet, of course."  
  
She slid her hand in to his back pocket.  
  
"You're going to rob the man you love at gun point?" He asked mockingly. "You really _are_ a dominatrix."  
  
Irene met his eyes suddenly, though there was an ironic smile resting over her lips.  
  
"I've done far worse to people I love far more," She spoke almost casually as she took his wallet from him and stepped away.  
  
"I really do hope you don't get yourself killed for the trouble of a _self-rescue._ Between this and your embarrassing admission, I would think that would be a rather humiliating blow."

"Oh, I'm sorry, do I look humiliated?" She said with a small shrug. "You're the one who's about to be stranded in a foreign country with no money, passport, or damsel in distress to take care of. I do apologize about that last part, though... But I've never been much for playing that particular role."

Sherlock bit down, and then after a moment:  
  
"You seemed rather good at it when you were on your knees about to have your head forcibly removed from you."  
  
Irene visibly stiffened, and the color all but drained from her face... And Sherlock took the unfortunate opportunity to reach out for her hand and angle her arm upwards so that the gun was pointed at the ceiling, uncocking the gun with his thumb. Before she even had a chance to react her back was against his chest, and her hair against his face. He held her there for a few moments, their labored breathing causing their bodies to move in unison with one another as they inhaled and exhaled deeply. For Sherlock's part, he had regretted the words he'd just spoken instantly. He regretted this whole miserable situation.

He pushed her away from him, and held the newly reacquired gun at arm's length, pointed at Irene whose back was still turned to him. This moment was fast becoming one of the more absurd he'd ever experienced... And it occurred to him, as she turned around to face him, that there was no _point_ in holding on to her now.

For the second time, for the _final_ time, he had to let her go.  
  
Sherlock lowered his arm, and let the gun hang idly in his hand at his side, dropping his eyes away from The Woman and inclining his body as though to allow her passage past him.

When she didn't move, Sherlock looked back up at her and saw the suspicion in her face and stance, and then gestured with his full arm toward the door.

"I wouldn't advise making the rest of the trip on your own, but as far as I'm concerned I've fulfilled my obligation to you."

His tone was resigned and honest, because what he just said was nothing more or less than the truth... And he was tired of fighting.

Irene started slowly toward the door with her eyes trained carefully on Sherlock, but when she was passing him, in a moment that was not premeditated; he caught her suddenly by the wrist. He wanted to tell her to be careful or even that there would never come a time where he would not cross continents to protect her. But he said neither thing.  
  
"When I was 15 years old, I had purposely developed a dependency on heroine." He started sharply, and Irene's face registered several phases of confusion as he spoke. "The why is not nearly as interesting as the how, but suffice it to say that the hobby got a bit away from me..." He paused to let his words sink in. "Mycroft found me, alone and high, and he saved my life. More than that, he kept it to himself for years. My brother and I may not have what would be described as a loving relationship, but when it matters, and sometimes things _do_ matter, I know he won't ever let me down."

And that, he felt went without saying, was why he kept Mycroft's photo in his bedroom.  
  
Sherlock let Irene's wrist go, and nodded shortly.  
  
"So you see..." He shook his head. "You don't know me, either."

The room was still until Irene spoke a few seconds later.

"I'm sorry." She said, her eyes wide.

Sherlock furrowed his forehead.  
  
"Wh--"  
  
She raised her hands and brought her elbows in, striking him hard in the abdomen. As he doubled over from the shock she once again took hold of the gun, and a moment later took the hilt and connected it unforgivingly with the back of Sherlock's head with such force of impact that she likely hurt herself doing it.  
  
Sherlock fell to the ground, and his last conscious thought before blacking out was:  
  
_That's my girl._

  **....**

 

Sherlock awoke in a daze, and only a moment passed before he realized he was sitting in the dining car on a train passing through somewhere in... Northern England, possibly? He wasn't sure exactly, but he didn't care, and neither did he care where the train was headed.  
  
Irene sat across the table at him sipping a cup of tea, but watching him from over the rim of her cup. Her eyes smiled.

The detective rubbed the back of his head and brought his bloody fingers round to his eyes to get a look at the result of the wound that The Woman before him had inflicted.

"Was that really necessary?" He asked.

"Do you dream of me on purpose?" The Woman responded with her own question, setting her cup down.

"I probably do."

She shrugged.  
  
"Well, never mind. I'm well on my way out of Pakistan now. You've done what you came to do. You must be very pleased."  
  
Sherlock looked out from the train window at the passing countryside.

"I'm pleased that you're safe."  
  
"Well, as safe as can be expected."  
  
He looked back at her.  
  
"I do love you."  
  
Irene made a sympathetic face.  
  
"I know... Pity this doesn't count, though."

 "Of course it doesn't. I wouldn't say it otherwise."  
  
"Ah, but you wanted to tell me in the hotel room. You're so good at denying yourself, aren't you? Sherlock Holmes, the ascetic."  
  
Sherlock didn't answer.  
  
"And now you've let me slip through your fingers a second time."

"I wouldn't describe being knocked unconscious with my own gun quite as 'letting you slip through my fingers'."

"You could have told me you loved me. Maybe I would have stayed."  
  
"It's likely you would have taken the gun and my dignity regardless of what I said... Though, it's possible I may have been able to save myself the head trauma."

"I did say sorry."

Sherlock had to laugh at that.

"I wish I could tell you exactly how much I do not accept your apology."

"In that case, it is my pleasure to inform you that the apology has been rescinded." A beat. "Time for you to wake up now, Mr. Sherlock Holmes."

**....**

Sherlock woke from his dream with a groan of pain, turning himself over with some effort on to his back, ironic and pained laughter escaping from his throat. Sunlight streamed in through the barely parted curtains, and he groggily brought his wristwatch to his eyes. It was several moments before he could focus well enough to tell the time. He dropped his arm to the ground beside him and he clenched his eyes closed for a moment against the pounding in his head. He'd been out for a little less than two hours.

When he opened his eyes again, his face was turned toward the bed... and immediately something on the floor, almost completely obscured by the dangling sheet, caught his eye.

He reached out for the object, and once it was in his hand his heart sank with a feeling of cold dread.  
  
It was Irene's new passport.

Sherlock stood unsteadily to his feet and quickly swept the room for any belongings he couldn't do without. The Woman had taken almost everything - the car keys, his wallet, his passport, and his gun... She'd only left behind his phone.

Between the time it took him to check his watch and the time he took to search the room, less than a minute had passed, and he was out the door before that minute was up.  
  
Irene wasn't going to get out of the country without this passport, and she had a 2-hour head start on him already.

* * *

**London, England**

**3 Months Later**

  
Sherlock sat across the desk from his brother, his hands tented in front of his face, listening to him go over the details of the plan that was possibly to take years of his life away.  
  
"-- In which case, there is a fire escape around the back of the building. If you should calculate that escape via that route is barred or impossible, then, and only then, will we move on to project Lazarus."

The Lazarus Project. The failsafe. The awful conclusion to a series of plans gone awry.  
  
"And how is that going?"  
  
"As you might imagine." Mycroft responded cryptically.

Sherlock took his hands down and took a deep breath, sitting back in his chair.  
  
"And when are you releasing him?"  
  
"Within the week."  
  
"He believes the information you've been feeding him is true?"  
  
"It's difficult to say what's going on in his head, but I should think he does."

Sherlock nodded almost absently.

"No going back now, little brother."  
  
Sherlock looked at Mycroft, his eyes sharpening.  
  
"Do you have a cigarette?"  
  
Mycroft blinked pointedly.  
  
"If that's all, I do have a meeting with the Prime Minister to attend to."  
  
Sherlock rolled his eyes. Standing up and rounding the chair he just occupied, he buttoned his jacket button and started toward the door.  
  
"Really, Mycroft, I don't know why you indulge him." He said with sarcastic pompousness.

"Actually," Mycroft said, and when Sherlock turned back to him he was standing in front of his desk, leaning backward with his arms folded. "There is one more thing."

"If this is about the knighthood again, I--"  
  
"It's come to my attention that you've recently traveled out of the country."

Sherlock's surprise at his brother's statement was such that he was sure he hadn't been able to conceal it from his face right away.  
  
"Has it?" He asked, taking a step back toward his brother.  
  
"Yes, but oddly, the record of your little holiday disappears somewhere around Russia... Yet here you are. Very decidedly _not_ in Russia."  
  
"Get better record keepers."  
  
"What could have possibly necessitated your leaving the country in such secrecy? You clearly went through a great deal of trouble to cover your tracks... And to whose benefit?"

"Oh, dear," Sherlock started mock gravely - his eyes never leaving his brother's. "Look at the time. Mustn’t keep the Prime Minister waiting." He cocked his head just a bit, a gesture that almost made it clear he would reveal nothing on purpose.

He turned to go.  
  
"I _will_ find out, Sherlock."  
  
Sherlock's hand hovered over the doorknob for a moment, before he twisted it and left the room.  
  
A few hours later, at 221B Baker Street, an irritated and bloodied Sherlock Holmes would burst through in to his parlor carrying a harpoon in his hand and wanting nothing more in the world... than a cigarette.

* * *

**221B Baker Street, London, England**

**2 January 2015**

 

Sherlock smiled to himself as he remembered John's reaction to him coming in to the flat covered in blood.

_"You went on the tube like that?"_

_"None of the cabs would take me!"_

He leaned back in his chair, reading over the words he had just written in the open text box - the cursor blinking expectantly at him, waiting on him to add the final words of his email.  
  
_I can't help but feel as though we've been at odds and at war since I first rang the doorbell in Belgravia,_ He typed.

_A war of attrition, Ms Adler, in which you've worn through my reserves and my resolve, and put me through the only hell I could ever believe in. You've brought me to my knees in more ways than one, and I know that I am beaten. Now, when I should hate you for it, I can only wonder at the whole affair. I've regretted you almost as long as I've known you, but time has worn through that as well. Now I can only appreciate having had the opportunity to be made a better man... Even if I didn't take it._

_So, you see, I am not worth missing or regretting. If you should ever feel any particular inclination toward either of those emotions in regards to me, please know that those duties will be particularly well taken care of by John and Mary Watson who, unfortunately for them, will not be sent an email talking them out of it._

Here, Sherlock smiled slightly again.

_Irene, you were amongst the most formidable opponents I've ever encountered, and you've afforded me a remarkable adventure. I'd offer my gratitude if I were that kind of man - but instead I offer you my respect. And all my love._

_Goodbye, Ms Adler._

_SH_

Sherlock stared at the screen and took a deep breath before hovering his cursor over the "send" button, but after a moment he stood without hitting it. Rubbing his pressed together hands down across his mouth, he crossed the room to the door and then the corridor to his bedroom.

He stood in the doorway for a few moments while looking it all over. Nothing was changed. Somehow, through all the years he'd lived here, and even some while he hadn't, very little had come or gone. Mrs. Hudson could have sold every possession he'd owned and let his rooms out when he was "dead"... but she hadn't. This place had always been right here waiting for him - constantly accruing new memories if little else.

He looked at his bed where he'd lain once with Irene, much more with Janine, but mostly completely alone. The very place where he'd contemplated the death of a woman he "barely knew" and nursed what he couldn't have understood at the time to be a broken heart.

He looked from the portrait of Poe to his bookshelf, to his lamp, to his armoire... Then finally to the photo that rested atop his chest of drawers. Without another thought or any hesitation he strode over to it. Turning it over, he unclasped the hinges on the frame and removed the photo - placing it directly in to his inside jacket pocket without looking at it.

He stared distractedly at the empty frame for a moment, before purposefully turning toward the wall and kneeling, focusing his attention on a particular area of the white trim just above the floor. Pushing slightly on the bit of loose wood, a piece of the trim board came loose, revealing a small hole in the wall.

Mycroft's men would have searched the flat thoroughly for weapons... and for drugs. But they wouldn't have found this hiding place.

Sherlock removed the hidden contents from the wall and was still for a moment, but then laughed shortly, quietly, unhappily, as a memory of something he'd said several months ago occurred to him... And though the circumstances were vastly different now than they were then, he said the words again.

"... In to battle."

**_..._ **

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wanted John's presence to be noticeably absent this chapter. Sherlock himself said that he is redeemed only by the warmth and constancy of John's friendship… And I wanted him to be alone here. 
> 
> Thank you again for reading! Onward to the conclusion!


	15. Becoming

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've tried to incorporate the tone of TAB and the trailer for series 4, so this chapter may seem a little different from the others. More than doing this story justice, I hope to have kept the spirit of the show alive in this final installment, because I've dedicated more hours of my life to this little corner of the fandom than I can count... This story is my love letter, of sorts, to BBC's Sherlock and to all the Adlock shippers out there.
> 
> This story and all of you have been a part of my life for almost 2 years, and all I can think to say now is thank you so much for going on this journey with me. Even if this isn't perfect, I hope you guys enjoy it!

**Come Attrition, Come Hell**

**Chapter 15: Becoming**

...

 

**Heathrow Airport, London**

**3 May, 2012**

  
Mycroft swallowed before taking a deep breath and was finally able to meet The Woman’s eyes.  
  
“There are limits to what I am able to offer you.” he spoke – an effort to maintain some semblance of control over the situation as far as Sherlock could see from his place in the shadows behind Irene. He couldn’t see her face as she responded to his brother, but he could imagine the smug and condescending turn of her lips as she spoke.  
  
“Oh, Mr. Holmes...” she started. “You and I both know that’s not true.”

_You and I both know that’s not quite true._

Sherlock could see his brother’s face harden in either anger or indignation, or more likely both – but it was infinitely preferable to the pity and disappointment that had been in its place moments before.

They were speaking now – The Woman and Mycroft. They were speaking quietly and seriously, and this was important. What had just happened, what had just been revealed, was _terribly_ important. And devastating. And humiliating… And, dear God, this was Sherlock’s worst nightmare come true.  
  
_In the end… are you really so obvious?_  
  
This wouldn’t have happened to his brother. It _couldn’t_ have happened to his brother.  
  
But _why_ couldn’t it?  
  
What was _it_? What just _happened_?  
  
“Sherlock, darling--” She was speaking to him now. _Darling_. She was calling him darling, and how he _hated_ the word, and her voice, and _her_. If he thought he’d known hate before this moment, he’d been wrong. She was cooing at him, asking him if he would be so kind as to move out of her way, or _telling_ him to move, or telling him to follow. He wasn’t sure. He didn’t know. His brother was walking now, too, and this was all very and _deliberately_ confusing. Something inside of him felt hollow, as though he’d fallen from a height and had had the air knocked out of his lungs, and now he was following his brother and The Woman down the aisle. He felt like a child being led by the hand back to his room after being caught up past his bedtime. He felt small, and he felt ashamed, and he felt…

Beaten.

The cool air of the night blew softly against his face as he walked back outside the plane and on to the staircase where The American waited patiently at the bottom. The American who said he felt like putting a bullet in his head.  
  
_They’d pin a medal on me if I did._  
  
They? They who? Americans? The American government? Did his egregious miscalculation extend so far outside of his usual sphere? Sherlock couldn’t help but not care. Outside his sphere was outside his scope, especially since the humiliation and shame he now felt penetrating the deepest reaches of his well being were so completely contained in his immediate environment. He felt naked, on display, viewed, judged. He felt alone. And if he ever thought he’d felt alone before in his life, he’d been wrong about that, too.  
  
_The promise of love...  
  
The pain of loss…_

Mycroft had accused him of letting The Woman make him feel special. He couldn’t… he didn’t… understand. Had he really let this happen? Had she made him feel special? Had he let her in? It didn’t seem possible. It didn’t seem right. Yet here they all were, the situation exactly how it was, moving toward an ending of something that he hadn’t realized had begun months ago. 

He’d felt something for Irene Adler. In order to begin to understand what was happening to him now, he had to sort through what little data he knew to be correct, and this – that he’d felt something for her – was nothing more than a bit of information. He’d felt something for her that he hadn’t felt for John, or Molly, or Mrs. Hudson, or Lestrade, or anyone. More than attraction, more than sentiment, more than infatuation, he’d felt… understood. She was like him. He knew she was like him. Clever, damaged, selfish, alone. People like them would always be alone. And this was why.  
  
And now? Now a new and altogether unpleasant feeling was engulfing whatever he’d felt for her before… and he knew that this night would end with either him or her, or more likely the both of them, torn completely to pieces.

Irene looked at the American as she passed him, and Sherlock thought it likely, judging by the way he bit down on his jaw, that the expression on her face was neither polite nor conciliatory. Mycroft avoided looking at The American all together, but Sherlock met his stare that was filled with both fury and satisfaction dead on. He didn’t care that this man felt himself above him at this moment, or that he had a perfectly valid reason for wearing the expression that he now wore as his thin lips stretched in to a small, knowing, hateful smirk. There were too many emotions and conflicting thoughts swirling and swaying through him that he didn’t have any room to spare.

He broke eye contact as he stepped out on to the tarmac behind his brother. The Woman stood in front of the door of what must have been the car she’d come in. 

“The Brothers Holmes.” She said with mock awe before smiling and stepping in to the back of her car. A moment later, the car pulled away, leaving “The Brothers Holmes” standing silently together in front of the 747.

Sherlock felt that he should say something, but he could think of no string of words that would fill the space in his chest or the chasm that now lay open between he and his brother.

“I imagine you’ll want to join us.” Mycroft said simply.

Sherlock kept his face neutral and impassive, though he knew that even a mask would fail to keep his mortification from his brother in this moment. 

“I imagine I would.”

* * *

**Islamabad**

**2 Months Later**

  
“She can’t have got far, least of all without the passport we attempted to provide her with.” Sherlock spoke in to his phone as he stepped quickly in to his newly hired car.

“We can track the car she stole from you, no?”  
  
“She dumped it. Likely hired another so that I can’t track her.”  
  
“Clever.”  
  
“Logical.” Sherlock countered. “If that’s what constitutes clever in your opinion, then pass me off to someone who might actually be able to help me find her.”  
  
“We’ll find her, Mr. Holmes, but...”  
  
His contact on the other end of the line trailed off, and then was silent.  
  
“But what?”  
  
“But is it worth the trouble? You have very little time to accomplish your remaining objectives, and delaying your departure at all would compromise the secrecy of your location. We discussed a very strict time table.”  
  
“All the more reason to move quickly. My main objective was to remove Miss Adler from harm’s way – and leaving her stranded in a country teaming with cells of an organization that wants her dead and that has the resources to hunt her down seems counter productive to that end.”  
  
“Yes, I--”  
  
“And anyone who’s watching still needs to believe that she was beheaded last night. That might prove difficult to manage if she’s spotted before I can get to her.”  
  
“It would be easiest to let her die at this point, Mr--”  
  
“Funny, it’s always easier to let people die, and yet no one is willing to offer that suggestion up when it’s their turn to be rescued. That was certainly not the case when I saved _your_ life.”  
  
The man on the other end sighed.  
  
“Of course, Mr. Holmes. I’ll contact you when we’ve located her. But you should prepare yourself in the event that she’s already been recaptured. If that has happened, we have already exhausted our resources in this area, and another attempt at her extraction would be impossible.”  
  
Sherlock pressed his lips together for a moment. He knew this was his fault. This whole miserable situation was his fault. If Irene was caught, if she died here, if he failed to save her…  
  
“I know.” he relented, and ended the call.

* * *

 

**London**  
**April 1997**

“Has anyone else seen him?” A stern voice asked from somewhere in the fog.

“Sure. Loads of people have seen him,” a different voice responded. “But look around you. No one’s going to recognize him in here.”

Something exchanged hands. Money? Sherlock couldn’t be sure.  
  
A moment later, someone was kneeling by his side.  
  
It was several more moments before that someone’s voice spoke.  
  
“Sherlock…” It sighed heavily – sadly.  
  
Sherlock fought the fog and tried to meet the disappointed voice head on, but fog was notoriously difficult to grapple with, and to make matters worse, he found that the floor didn’t feel quite solid beneath him.  
  
“I can’t…” He started in a horse whisper. “I don’t...”  
  
“Where’s the list?” The disembodied voice demanded firmly, and somehow it seemed more real for it. And familiar. “I can’t help you until you’ve given me the list.”  
  
The list… The list… The list? The list was…  
  
“In my pocket.” Sherlock ground out, barely aware of his words, or of the list, or what any of this meant. He only knew that he _had_ a list, that he _always_ had a list, and that it was, indeed, in his left trouser pocket.  
  
He pulled it out himself, and held it out to the air. The air took it.  
  
“For God’s sake,” the air whispered, and then louder: “Sherlock, listen to me.”

Sherlock opened his eyes and looked at his brother who appeared angry and heartbroken… or, at least, Sherlock’s concept of it.  
  
Mycroft gestured with the slip of paper in his hand.  
  
“Never again,” he asserted. “Do you hear me, Little Brother? This is the last time.”  
  
It was always the last time until the next time.  
  
He must have mumbled as much, because when his brother spoke again it was with a deadly serious tone that almost lacked sympathy – but not quite. Not yet.  
  
“This _will_ be the last time.” He said.  
  
Sherlock groaned. Coming of it was always the worst part, but not because it hurt, although it did hurt… But because he could feel the world rushing back in to meet him like water rushing in through a compromised ship’s hull. The boredom, the tedium, the otherness, the taunting, the loneliness, the feeling of utter uselessness in a reality where there was no practical application for the processes of his mind – because people either didn’t understand or didn’t care, or they did understand and they hated him for it.  
  
The last time? Mycroft expected this to be the last time? Well, just what the hell else was he supposed to do?  
  
He must have said that aloud, too.  
  
“When you’re lucid and cleaned up, Inspector Lestrade has expressed that he would like to consult with you over a case he’s working on.”  
  
Sherlock furrowed his forehead, feeling suddenly more awake than he had in days.

“Lestrade...” He repeated more or less to himself, and then he refocused on his brother suddenly. “That’ll be The National Museum, I suspect?”

Mycroft let out something like a small, sarcastic laugh.

“Been following it, have you?”  
  
Sherlock sat up and closed his eyes for a moment against the wave of dizziness that followed.  
  
“Of course. It’s been a textbook example of exactly what the police should do if they _don’t_ want to solve a crime.” He ran his hand over his face. “I’m glad they’ve finally decided to consult someone who knows what he’s doing.”  
  
“I can only assume you are referring to yourself.”  
  
Sherlock shot Mycroft a dazed look of contempt, and then went to brace his weight so that he could stand… but his brother stopped him.  
  
“Sober up first. You’re not going like this.” He asserted. Sherlock rolled his eyes, and began to stand, but Mycroft kept his grip on him. “Do you understand me? _Never_ like this.”

Sherlock stared his brother in the eyes for a long moment, and realized they were precariously close to touching on something he didn’t like, so he laughed bitingly and threw the older brother’s hand off of him.

“This?” He asked, standing unsteadily to his feet. “Who needs _this_ when Lestrade needs my help with a case?”

He began wobbling toward the way out.

“There won’t always be a case, Sherlock.” Mycroft said, standing himself. Sherlock turned back to face him. “And there won’t always be a big brother around to clean up your messes.”

“It’s a little late in the game to try and be a big brother, Mycroft. Maybe you should try adopting a puppy.”

Mycroft raised his head.

“Hate me if you must, but contrary to what you’ve told people since you were 8 years old, I _am_ your big brother, and I will continue to be concerned for you until you grow up and make the decision to be concerned for yourself.”  
  
Sherlock put his hands in his pockets, feeling very sick, but not willing to show it.  
  
“Oh, God – are you threatening me with affection?”  
  
Mycroft’s eyebrows went up in mock surprise – and with that expression, his face was suddenly devoid of sympathy and brotherly “concern.”  
  
“Affection? Absolutely not.” He said, and ticked his head as though in disappointment. “But I am threatening you.”  
  
“Ah. There you are, _Big Brother_.”  
  
“I know that it’s your very favorite thing, but I’d advise against testing me. Clean yourself up, or I will find a place to put you where it won’t matter.”  
  
“I’d like to see you try.” Sherlock intoned defiantly – or, rather, as defiantly as he could manage while high and not quite fully coherent.  
  
“No,” Mycroft shook his head, and a shadow seemed to cross his face. “You wouldn’t.”  
  
Sherlock sneered with a “hmph”, and then turned to walk away.  
  
“I always enjoy our visits, Mycroft.” He called behind him, and then left the room.  
  
Once around the corner, he leaned suddenly against the wall and shielded his face from the sun streaming in through a window at the end of the corridor. He knew he had only seconds to compose himself before Mycroft came this way, so he quickly did his damnedest to suppress the anger and the wretchedness and the shame that seemed to seep through every defense he’d ever thought to put up against them.  
  
The truth was, he hated his brother. He hated him almost as much as he _most begrudgingly_ admired him. He hated him for being better, cleverer, and always one step ahead – for being an impossible standard to live up to. What space could a second Holmes brother possibly fill in this world? What role?  
  
And he hated him for this pain, too, because try as he might to ignore it – there couldn’t have existed a worse form of agony than loving someone who made him hate himself. Because he did love his brother, probably for a lot of the same reasons he hated him, and he thought it likely that, despite everything, his brother probably loved him, too… But what use was it? What use was love when all it did was cause pain, and anger, and shame so deep that it made breathing difficult? What was the point?

So, he didn’t just hate his brother. He _despised_ him… And as Sherlock Holmes sobbed against the wall, his only consolation was that he most likely wouldn’t remember feeling any of this the next day. 

But… he wasn’t sobbing against a wall, was he?  
  
“It will pass.” Mycroft’s voice came through the haze of opiate induced emotion.  
  
Sherlock’s arms were wrapped tightly around him as he cried in to his shoulder, but at these words he gripped the material of the older man’s coat into knots in his hands until his knuckles were white with strain.

“It will pass, William.” Mycroft repeated, using Sherlock’s given name. The name that the children would use to taunt him on the school yard. The name the teachers used to reprimand him for speaking out of turn. A common, ordinary name.

“I hate you.” Sherlock bit out between sobs.  
  
Mycroft was quiet for a moment before responding, but then he offered, gently:  
  
“It will pass.”

* * *

**England**

**2 January, 2015**

_It will pass…_

Sherlock vaguely remembered an instance shared with his brother years before this moment. He’d been about as high as he’d ever been in his life… but it had been the last time for quite a _long_ time. He’d begun to steadily work with Lestrade after that day, and then he’d met John a few years later. Everything changed for him – and he knew that if his brother hadn’t found him when he did, he probably would have just died in that drug den.  
  
Mycroft handed Sherlock a black iPhone from his seat next to him in the back of the car that was transporting them to the place that would be Sherlock’s last view of England.  
  
“Monitored, of course.” He said.  
  
Sherlock placed the phone in his trouser pocket without looking at his brother.  
  
“It will pass.” He said under his breath with an ironic short laugh.  
  
Mycroft looked at him.  
  
“What did you say?”  
  
“The funeral’s going to be amusing, don’t you think?” Sherlock responded, looking out from his window at London as it passed him for the last time. “’The great Hat Detective – dead again.’”

Mycroft cleared his throat, but said nothing.  
  
“I trust you’ve taken care of my requests?”  
  
Mycroft nodded.  
  
“Your friends will be well protected, and John is en route to meet us as we speak.”  
  
Sherlock looked down at his lap.  
  
“And Miss Adler?”  
  
“Ah, yes. Miss Adler. We’ve struck up a deal with her. In her time as a dominatrix, she collected more than just photos. We’ve offered her immunity in exchange for her testimony against certain prolific criminals.”  
  
“And her silence for others, I presume.” Sherlock responded bitterly.  
  
“Yes, well, prudence _is_ a virtue.”  
  
Sherlock scoffed.  
  
“Prudence. Is that what you call it?”  
  
“What would you call it?”  
  
Sherlock looked at his brother.  
  
“Cowardice.” he said simply.  
  
“Well, I’m afraid that your and Miss Adler’s idea of bravery--”  
  
Sherlock scoffed at that, too.  
  
“Bravery.” He repeated the word as though it were ridiculous. “Do you really think that I believe what I did to Magnussen was an act of bravery?” He laughed, but there was no mirth in the sound. “Moral ambiguity aside, in the absence of consequence, I merely did what needed to be done. As did Irene.”  
  
“There are always consequences.”  
  
Sherlock smirked dangerously.  
  
“Yes,” he said. “And bravery would have meant taking them in to account.”  
  
“And just what _did_ you take in to account that day?”  
  
_My family_ , Sherlock’s mind answered without hesitation, and _in_ his mind, his family was every person that he’d come to care for, because none of them were safe as long as Magnussen knew what he knew – as long as Magnussen had anything on him. He’d wanted Sherlock in his back pocket, which meant he was willing to extort his “pressure” points and resort to any manner of nefarious deeds. Sherlock couldn’t have allowed a means to harm his friends through himself. Not John or Mary Watson, not The Woman… not even his brother.  
  
Of course, he didn’t respond to the question at all aloud.  
  
Mycroft looked out from his own window.  
  
“I take it you blame me for this.”  
  
Sherlock bit down, his mouth becoming a flat line on his pale face.  
  
In some ways – in significant ways – yes, he did blame Mycroft… but ultimately that particular truth was cruel considering the circumstances. Sherlock had believed before that truth was a neutral idea – that it was neither bad nor good, but that it was always the objective. To see what was real, to see what others didn’t see, to know what lay behind the lie.  
  
But maybe, occasionally, the truth was just not worth the hurt it could cause.  
  
“Of course I don’t blame you, don’t be absurd.” He said with an impatient gesture of his hand as though to wave the thought off. It was all he could offer in the way of grace in this matter, but he figured it would be enough for his brother.  
  
Mycroft took a deep breath.

“Sherlock, there is… one more thing that I should mention.”

Sherlock creased his forehead and turned his head toward his brother. He didn’t know what else there could possibly be to say now.

“If you haven’t felt the need to say it until now,” Sherlock started, and then faced forward. “I can probably do without hearing it.”

“It’s to do with Irene Adler.”  
  
Sherlock’s awful betraying heart skipped a beat. He’d refrained from asking for any specifics about her whereabouts or what she had been doing, because he didn’t want her to be any more real to him than she was. It had been years since she’d been tangible to him, and all that was really left of her to hold on to now was the sound of her voice, and the smell of her skin. Wisps and wafts of the most extraordinary woman he’d ever known of. It wasn’t that he didn’t miss her, because he did. It wasn’t that he didn’t love her, because he _absolutely_ did. It wasn’t that he didn’t want her in his life… Because he knew now that he _did_. It was that if he didn’t know where she was, or what she was doing, he could _imagine_ instead. He could imagine that she was fighting, and laughing, and tricking, and living, and possibly loving him.  
  
And if he were to suddenly know anything about an Irene Adler that he _didn’t_ know, an Irene Adler that wasn’t his now and could never be his again – that had never actually been his to begin with – considering everything else he was losing, everything else he would never know (John’s child being one glaring example)… He didn’t know how he’d be able to carry on with his. Which, since he didn’t have a choice, would have been unfortunate.  
  
“She’s alive.” Sherlock said more than asked, just to make sure nothing had changed on that front since last he had inquired about her.  
  
“Yes.” Mycroft responded laconically.  
  
“Then, it’s as I said,” Sherlock intoned quietly, straightening his collar. “Whatever news you have, I can do without hearing it.”

* * *

 

**Baker Street**  
**27 December, 2011**

Sherlock couldn’t sleep.

He couldn’t eat. He couldn’t… think.

“Of course she’s cheating on you, you blind idiot!” he railed against the telly, gesturing with both hands at the screen before resting his chin in his hand again.

“It is just a show, Sherlock.” John commented from his seat at the wooden parlor table from over his newspaper.

Sherlock pointed at the screen, but didn’t look at John.  
  
“She flicks her eyes to-- you see, there.” he pointed more emphatically at this. “She flicks her eyes to the right whenever she’s lying.”  
  
“Well… she’s an actress. She’s paid to do that.”  
  
Sherlock switched the television off with the remote control in frustration, and then, sitting up, ran both hands through his hair restlessly. His thoughts turned to the camera phone in his dressing gown pocket, but he refused to pull it out.  
  
“Are you going to look at cases today?” John asked, an infuriating hint of worry in his voice.  
  
“Cases,” Sherlock scoffed. “What cases?”  
  
He picked up a newspaper near by and then threw it back down, stood up and grabbed John’s newspaper, looked at it, and then tossed it on to the breakfast table.  
  
John didn’t even get upset at this blatant lack of respect for his news reading. Which was irritating in itself. He knew his friend was concerned for him. He knew Mrs. Hudson was concerned. He knew his brother was concerned that he’d turn to drugs. And for what? Over what? A cigarette after a trying day? A woman laying dead in a morgue? He’d smoked countless cigarettes after hard days, and he’d seen countless dead women.  
  
Sherlock picked up his violin and began to play the first tune that came to mind, and John just watched him for a few moments.  
  
“You are allowed to be sad, you know.”  
  
Sherlock continued to play, but said nothing.

“Sherlock,” his friend implored. “You’re allowed to be human.”

Sherlock closed his eyes, pulling his bow along the strings of his instrument…  
  
Slowly, the tune that had been rolling around in his brain for the past 2 nights began to manifest itself in the air around him as he continued to play, intermingled with other notes and other sounds, but this tune rose above the others, and it was becoming recognizable to him now.

John was speaking to him, but he was no longer listening.

He was walking up the steps and into Irene’s bedroom in her flat. He was looking around, looking for… clues? Looking for her? The makeup on her dressing table was left in such a way that appeared to be waiting for her to return. The curtains were pulled back. The air smelled of perfume and… something else that was entirely feminine but not immediately placeable. This was not the room of a dead woman. This room expected Irene Adler to walk through its doorway. That bed expected Irene Adler to sleep in it tonight. The view through these windows did not intend to go permanently unseen.

Sherlock opened his eyes, letting out a breath that he hadn’t been aware that he’d been holding… After an admittedly painful moment of allowing reality to rush back to him, he looked around.

It was night, and John was gone.

He clenched his jaw and put his violin down on the table near him, and headed to his bedroom for his coat.

He needed a cigarette.

* * *

 

**  
Hertfordshire, England**

**Before the Fall**

Sherlock sat down on the swing next to the young Emma Clark who didn't look at him. She appeared somehow older than she had when she stood tearfully in his flat begging him to find her mother. He hadn’t understood then the need for coddling or tact. He’d known the truth, and saw no reason why this little girl shouldn’t have known as well… And while he didn’t regret telling her, he did regret that he hadn’t been able to stop Moriarty before any of this had happened.

"You were right." She said quietly.

Sherlock looked forward with a small nod.

"I usually am."

There was a quiet beat – the girl continuing to look anywhere but upon Sherlock’s face.

"I tried to be angry at you, but it wasn't your fault."

"If it’s any consolation, your grandfather was quite angry enough for the both of you." Sherlock responded, his hand subconsciously going to his eye where her grandfather had made his anger quite apparent on his face weeks earlier.

Emma let out a noise of sad amusement.

"You said you took the case."

Sherlock turned to her.

"I did." He responded laconically.

She looked at him finally, her eyes sharp.

"Do you know who did this?" She asked.

Sherlock paused before answering.

"I do."

She nodded.

"Are you going to catch him?"

"I'm going to do more than that."

"Do you promise?"

Sherlock looked forward again, biting the inside of his lower lip. He didn't accept promises, and he didn’t make them either.

"Promises can be broken," he started, "But when I tell you that I will find every person involved in the death of your mother and make them accountable for what they've done..." He turned his eyes back to the young girl. "That's better than a promise. It's the truth."

There was a spark in the girl's eyes that flashed for a moment that was plainly the recognition of the difference between being made a promise and being told the truth.

"I believe you." She responded.

“You’ll have to keep believing me even when it seems impossible.” He told her cryptically… But children were always better at accepting these kinds of things than adults were, and she didn’t let him down with her response.  
  
“I will.” She said resolutely. “I believe in you, Mr. Holmes.”  
  
Sherlock looked around the playground for a moment, and then stood. This was his last loose end, and now it was tied up.  
  
“Do give my best to your grandfather.” He said, before pulling up his collar, and walking away.

* * *

 

**Saint Bart’s Hospital**

**London**

**After the Fall**

 

Sherlock stared forward blankly, his dark hair matter against his skin with the coagulating blood red substance that had been artfully splattered across his forehead and face.

Molly walked in through the door behind him, a towel in hand. There was a car waiting round back for him, he knew, but he was taking a few moments to collect himself anyway. There was very little time, and if John were to see him making his exit... This would have all been for nothing.

Molly handed him the towel she held and he took it front her absently. He said "thank you"... Or thought he had for a moment, but the rather undisturbed silence of the room indicated that he hadn't spoken at all.

Molly stood silently for a few moments, as though she wanted to say or do something, but she said and did nothing. Finally she turned to to go. She had a job to do – an act to put on. In fact, she was to be the face of his deception for God only knew how long... So, Sherlock supposed, no one really knew. He was suddenly grateful that he hadn't said "thank you" aloud, as it would have been grotesquely inadequate. Molly wasn't an actress, and she certainly wasn't a liar – her emotions and intentions always clearly visible on her face (even if, he conceded to himself, he had been too illiterate in the language they had been articulated in to take notice of either for a time). This was going to be difficult for her. But she was doing it. For him.

"Molly." He spoke abruptly, without turning to look at her, stopping her from leaving – her hand outstretched to the door.

He remembered when he was young that he'd overheard another child around his age having a bit of a row with his mother that ended with him loudly proclaiming "you'll be sorry when I'm dead!"

Which struck Sherlock at the time as being amazingly manipulative, because yes... Had the boy died, the mother would, indeed, have been sorry. Forcing her to imagine the scenario was emotion manufacturing at its best, really.

In any case, it led him to speculate about his own death for just about the remainder of the day, and he'd come to the conclusion that his eventual ending was not a traumatic enough inevitably to threaten anyone with, and that, aside from his mother and father, there'd quite likely be no people at his funeral.

He'd believed that almost his whole life... And it made being himself quite easy.

_I don't have friends._

_Alone protects me._

_What do you need?_

_That's my friend!_

Unfortunately he knew now that what he thought had been true all along may not have actually been the case. Which made things much harder than he had expected them to be.

"Thank you." He intoned monotonously. 

Molly turned to him, her hand still outstretched toward the door. She looked horribly sad, and Sherlock realized that this is what he did to people. He made them angry, or sad, or he disgusted them, or he disappointed them. He didn’t have to be so cruel out there on the ledge as he spoke to John. He didn’t have to rip the heart out of one of the only chests that loved him. He could have just said “goodbye”, and jumped. Wouldn’t that have got the point across?  
  
“I don’t deserve it.” he finished his thought before Molly could say anything, though she didn’t look like she was going to say anything anyway.

Sherlock stood abruptly, strode toward the door and, pushing past Molly almost rudely, opened and walked through it.

That was enough self reflection. It was time to get to work.

* * *

 

**Baker Street**

**2 January, 2015**

 

Sherlock stepped in to his flat for the first time since the _last_ time – pausing just momentarily before his feet crossed the threshold into the parlor. He’d left this exact spot not even a half day earlier and had believed that he’d never find himself here again. He’d seen another London sunset when he thought that he’d experienced his “very last night.” He was back. He almost couldn’t believe that he was back. He felt a measure of near pure relief that he’d only ever felt, maybe, twice before in his life. Once was when he’d pulled John out alive from the Guy Fawkes fire. The other had been…

It didn’t matter. As he quickly worked to unbutton his coat, he began to distance himself from the feeling. The time for sentiment and rash decision making was over. 

“I’ve secured you a tentative pardon.” Mycroft’s voice came from the kitchen. Sherlock, unfazed by the unexpected visitor, turned calmly to see his brother leaning against the kitchen table, his arms folded.

“Terms?” He asked, not missing a beat.

“Oh, you know… No more murders of high profile media magnates. That sort of thing.”  
  
“Cross my heart.” Sherlock replied tonelessly, throwing his coat over a wooden dining chair.

“They’re not pleased about this.”

“They?”  
  
“My superiors.”

“You don’t have superiors.”  
  
“Everyone answers to someone, Sherlock. Even you.”

Sherlock’s expression changed for a moment as though to show how very little he took that statement seriously, because… To be honest, here he was. Magnussen was dead and the Watsons were safe, and he was back home at Baker Street with a mostly solidified pardon on his horizon. Aside from the awful headache and looming sense of dread, he was relatively no worse for the wear.

“I guess I’ll just have to take your word for it.”  
  
“I suppose this _would_ all seem quite amusing to you. You got away with murder. You even came out of it with a case.”

Sherlock tilted his head just perceptibly. 

“You don’t sound all together too happy for me.”  
  
Mycroft smirked, but no, he didn’t look “too happy.”  
  
“Did I want you to be sent away to die? Of course not… I _did_ want you to become the man I’ve always believed you could be. The man you were always meant to be. But I believe I may have seen that man die of a drug overdose on a plane earlier today.”  
  
Sherlock creased his forehead, and although he said nothing… his brother’s words more or less hit their mark.  
  
Mycroft stood straight from his leaning position.  
  
“Well, anyway,” he continued. “It’ll make no difference to you. I’ve only come to give you this.”

With that, he pulled a large envelope out from inside his coat, and set it on the table. Sherlock eyed it suspiciously.

“What is that?” he asked.  
  
Mycroft took in a deep breath.  
  
“She’s married, Sherlock.” He answered plainly, and Sherlock could feel the immediate pain in his chest and sinking of his stomach the moment the words were out of his mouth. “The couple have a daughter, and the family currently resides in Italy. You’ll find all the proof you need in this envelope.”  
  
Sherlock swallowed the dry lump that had suddenly appeared in his throat, and his breath caught slightly. Married was one thing. A child was another. These words didn’t make sense in the way they were strung together. Married. Daughter. Family. Each word was a needle puncture though his lungs, slowly letting air out that he couldn’t recover. He didn’t want to know this. Married. Daughter. Family. What did this mean? What did these words mean?

Married. Daughter. Family.

He didn’t want to parse it. He didn’t want to know this. He didn’t want to understand.

But he did understand. Of course he did.

He’d spent 4 and a half years saying goodbye to Irene Adler, and now she was really gone.  
  
“I thought you needed to know.”  
  
Sherlock sharpened his focus on his brother.  
  
“Why would I need to know?” he asked, his chest burning, and the clear edge of bitterness in his voice betraying exactly what he felt. “She’s always been free to do as she pleased. What difference does it make to me if she’s married or if she’s...” he trailed off. He didn’t know how to continue. He didn’t know what to say. He didn’t know how to hide the hurt that was so plain in his voice that he could almost see it reflected in his brother’s face. He didn’t want to feel this. Not right now. Not today. Not when he’d thought he’d confronted this situation as competently as he could have managed already. Not when he had so many other things battling for his attention and awareness. He couldn’t spare the mind space. He couldn’t spare the effort.

This pain was unexpected and breathtaking, and if his brother would, just this once, have the grace to see that Sherlock was barely keeping himself together as it was… He’d take it all back, and help him pretend this day had never happened.

Like a proper big brother.

“I read your email.” Mycroft offered by way of an answer. “Well-- intercepted it.”

And still, Sherlock’s embarrassment that his brother would have been privy to his most intimate of declarations to The Woman was still nothing compared to his heartache. There was a time when that would have been an impossible feat to accomplish, but that seemed like a lifetime ago now.  
  
“This is what you were trying to tell me in the car.” He stated, his eyes becoming almost distant for a moment, but then he snapped back to attention. “Intercepted?”  
  
“Yes.” Mycroft answered. “She’ll never read it.”  
  
Sherlock closed his eyes, and couldn’t tell if what he felt was relief or disappointment. It had taken so much of himself, so much of everything he had left for her to write that email… It was the culmination of their relationship; a confession, an apology, a goodbye. It was the beginning and the end. He would never be able to find it in himself to write that letter again, and so in this moment of crushing pain he still had to wonder… was it all for nothing, then?  
  
“But I suppose this is good news for you?” Mycroft asked, and Sherlock opened his eyes to stare at his brother. “You’ll never see her again. You’ll never have to own up to these feelings you thought you had for her.”  
  
Sherlock narrowed his eyes.

_Thought_ he had… What a very telling thing to say.

“And are you pleased with yourself?” he responded coolly, though he felt anything but calm. “You were right after all.”  
  
“Right about what?”  
  
“You knew years ago. You’ve known all along. Caring… is not an advantage.”

He tried to ignore that his voice caught, but he was certain his brother hadn’t missed it.

Mycroft stood silently watching Sherlock for a few moments seemingly trying to read the situation as though he would words on a page.

“No, I’m not pleased about this.” he responded finally with a gravity that did not seem completely natural. “I can’t pretend that I’ve always been the very picture of brotherly affection, but I have tried to shield you from this kind of pain your whole life.”

“Shield me?” Sherlock spat. “How have you ever shielded me from anything?”  
  
“By striving to teach you what our parents would not. I’ve shown you the disadvantage in sentiment, and have attempted to protect you from yourself.”

Sherlock laughed at that.

“Ah, but you’ve broken your own rule, Mycroft. Clearly you’ve made me your disadvantage in spite of your self. Isn’t that why you let the children at school taunt me mercilessly and beat me senseless? Is that why you’ve sent me off on dangerous missions one after the other? Is that why you’ve set yourself up as a standard that I could never reach?”  
  
Mycroft raised his head.  
  
“Yes.” he responded simply. “And what have you learned from it all, Brother Mine?”  
  
Sherlock rotated his jaw and swallowed.  
  
_Alone is what I have. Alone protects me._  
  
“That I am alone.” he responded quietly, and then: “And that you can congratulate yourself now for being a constant source of the exact type of pain that you’ve always sought to ‘shield’ me from.” he finished harshly. He knew that he would not be saying these words or admitting these long held secrets if he were in his right state of mind, but since he _wasn’t_ in his right state of mind, he didn’t care.

Mycroft’s face remained impassive, though his eyes revealed a sadness that his expression did not.

“I am your brother. I have always wanted what was best for you, to assist you in becoming what you _could_ be.”

Sherlock ran his hands over his face in frustration.

“I am a murderer and a drug addict.” he let out, raising his voice. “You said it yourself just now, didn’t you? The man I was supposed to be died of a drug over dose earlier today on a plane that _you_ put me on.”  
  
“Those are things you have done, not things that you are. In spite of your failings, you are intelligent and--”

“Intelligent,” Sherlock scoffed. “I am miserable, and alone. Just like you – but then I suppose that _was_ always the point, wasn’t it? Crafting a piece of machinery in your own image. You chiseled away at everything that made me normal, and now I’m… What am I? I can’t be like them, and I can never be you, so what am I?”

Mycroft raised his chin.

“Sherlock Holmes.”

Sherlock clenched his jaw and closed his eyes for a moment, his hands twitching at his sides. He made a move to walk away, but at the last second stayed rooted in place. He could think of nothing to say, because the truth was too convoluted to voice aloud. In the end, he knew, with or without Mycroft’s influence, he likely would have turned out much the same way. He couldn’t blame his whole existence on his brother, as much as he would have liked to and as much as Mycroft seemed willing to accept the responsibility. And, really, Sherlock couldn’t imagine being a different man. Maybe without his brother around he would have formed more attachments, made more friends, fallen in love with more than one person in his life, or maybe he’d have died of a cocaine overdose years ago… but it would have been as himself. And so Mycroft was wrong on this account.

There was no “becoming” who he was supposed to be. There was no one else. There was nothing else. There was just this. This man who could never have been anything different.

“Sherlock Holmes,” he said almost under his breath, seemingly just repeating his brother.

“I’m sorry,” Mycroft spoke. “But you know you are better off this way. Neither of us was meant to be… one of them.”

“Moriarty would applaud the sentiment.”

“Yes, and if he’s back, so will Britain. The country needs you, Little Brother, now more than it ever has. I need to know that you can put your past behind you and focus.”  
  
“My past?” Sherlock let out a short laugh. “You mean The Woman.”  
  
“I mean anything that will make you vulnerable. Including Irene Adler.”  
  
A silence spanned between the two men at these words that went on for several moments before Sherlock looked down and gestured loosely at the doorway.  
  
“Get out.” he said.  
  
Mycroft held his hands straight at his sides, keeping his head high… and then began toward the hallway. He made it as far as the archway before Sherlock looked back up.  
  
“Mycroft.” he said.  
  
His brother stopped, and turned back to look at him.  
  
Sherlock pulled the photograph he’d taken from the frame in his bedroom earlier that day from his jacket pocket, and threw it at Mycroft’s feet. His brother’s eyebrows knit together in a frown as as he looked down at it, then looked back up at Sherlock with confusion written plainly across his face.  
  
“You won’t be my disadvantage anymore.” Sherlock said in a hard, low grumble.  
  
Mycroft’s expression did not change before he looked down again, turned, then was gone.

Sherlock took a deep and shaking breath, blinking his eyes rapidly against the pain in the middle of his body, before striding to the kitchen table and taking up the orange envelope that Mycroft had left there in his hands. He removed from it a small stack of photographs, but knew from the first that he couldn't bear to look at any of the others – which was odd, really. He'd always been able to separate emotion from experience, and here was a chance to gain insight and data. Information that would, how had he thought of it when he'd taken Irene's pulse all those years ago? Information that would help to paint a more complete portrait of what was happening. Of what had already happened.

But this first photograph – photograph of a beautiful woman in white, clearly taken without her knowledge, a bouquet of flowers in her hands, a smile of genuine contentment upon her face such that he had never given her cause to show – this was The Woman in a wedding dress. More than that, this was The Woman on her wedding day.

It was just her. There was no newly espoused man or woman anywhere in sight, but he knew the person was nearby somewhere. Making her smile _t_ _hat_ smile... And God, Sherlock's heart was breaking even as he couldn't help but feel so much relief for her. If this, a marriage, a family, normality, if this is what she'd always somehow wanted, he never would have been the one to give it to her. Because as much as he loved this woman, he wasn't made for that kind of life. The universe had deemed it so, and Mycroft had made sure it was carried out.

He placed the rest of the photos back in the envelope, though he kept the one out. Slightly clenching his hands around it, not exactly with enough force to crumple it, he took a deep breath and tossed the envelope in to the bin nearest him.

He'd tried so many times, _so many_ times to rid Irene Adler from his heart and his mind... But perhaps he had never been able to accomplish the task, because deep down he believed she was always out there waiting to come back to him; that they would both always wait to come back to each other, even if they likely never would. But now? Now so many things had changed. He had a real purpose here, and Irene was gone and married and happy. He never would have made her happy… So, he realized, he would have settle for being happy _for_ her.

Even if he hated her for this, too.

He could feel it all dying away now. All the loyalty, and understanding, the bond, the years. It was all fading and withering, until all he could feel was an ache and an emptiness where his love and hope for The Woman had been – had _always_ been, even when he refused to acknowledge it. Because, he was certain now, he had absolutely loved her from the moment he first saw her.

But… how long had he loved an idea of a person that no longer existed?

Sherlock breathed in a deep and shaking breath and started toward his bedroom, still clutching the photograph in his right hand. Once there, he walked purposefully toward the frame that was open and upturned on top of his drawers from this morning and replaced its emptiness with The Married Woman.

His brother had been his reminder for so long that there existed love in hate, that there could exist loyalty in an adversary, that there existed someone who could beat him. A person that had both weakened him and made him stronger. He he always been the “standard.” But now?

The Woman would be his reminder now.

 

**...**

 

Sherlock stood staring at his bathroom mirror, his hands braced against the sink basin. He looked like hell, and didn’t feel too much better. The events of the last couple of months were finally taking their toll. He’d kept going – pushing – because he had never known anything different. Get shot? Keep pushing. Mary’s a trained assassin? Keep pushing. Magnussen’s information was all stored in his head? Keep pushing. Keep pushing, keep pushing, keep pushing. Always keep moving. Never stand idle. Even in solitary confinement, he’d never let himself rest. He’d stopped eating, had generally stopped sleeping, had stopped speaking. He’d stopped all the processes that made him human, but kept alive the processes that made him Sherlock. That’s what he’d always done. Always.  
  
But now… he was just tired. He was coming off a high so profound that it had shown him an alternate universe, and was laying to rest a love so deep that it had fundamentally changed the man he had been. So, yes, he was tired. Exhausted, really.  
  
He turned around and bent over to twist the knob so hot water began filling the tub basin, and soon enough the room began to fill with steam. He turned back to the mirror and began to unbutton his shirt, his hands shaking, before shrugging the fabric down his shoulders… And a rush of cold air hit his skin that he hadn’t quite expected.

“Those scars weren’t there before, if I recall.”

Sherlock’s heart skipped a beat. No, it actually stopped. He was dying now, probably. Or… maybe hallucinating. Was he really still that high? How many drugs had he actually done that morning? He’d referred to it as “controlled usage”, but the things he’d experienced today hadn’t seemed massively controlled. To be fair, though, he hadn’t slept at all in at least 3 days, so… Yes. He supposed he was probably both dying and hallucinating.

He turned his head from the mirror to see – hair in soft curls on her shoulders, pink lips and cheeks, bright eyes, beautiful and awful at once – The Woman at the bathroom door that led from his bedroom. She closed it quietly behind her, looking at him as though this were the most normal occurrence in the world – as though he had seen her every day for the past 4 years. As if he weren’t having a heart attack.

“And I _do_ recall.” She finished suggestively, leaning against the counter with her arms folded across her chest. “You’re beginning to lose your touch, Sherlock. I thought you’d have known I was coming before I got here.”

Sherlock’s first attempt at speaking was thwarted by the absence of air in his lungs – but never one to give up, he gave it another go.

“You’ve stopped wearing perfume.” He observed dumbly.

Irene laughed.

“No, I haven’t. This is just a special occasion. You don’t think I know that Sherlock Holmes keeps a mental index of popular perfumes and the women of note who wear them? Darling. Give a girl a little credit.”

Darling. She was calling him _darling_. This was the second time she’d pulled the world out from underneath his feet, and the room was spinning, and the steam was stifling, and he couldn’t get oxygen deep enough in to his body, and she was calling him darling. _Darling_. A word that she’d only ever used to hurt him, or to _try_ to hurt him, but if he was being honest with himself it _had_ always hurt him. If he was being _completely_ honest, this woman had hurt him every time she’d ever opened her mouth to speak.

 

Sherlock shook his head once, slowly, still not completely convinced that this was really happening – and if it was really happening, not at all understanding why. Or how.  
  
“What are you doing here?” he demanded, probably a bit more harshly than he had meant to.  
  
She smirked knowingly at him.  
  
“Haven’t you heard? I’m to be the key witness in-- oh, but what am I saying? Of course you’ve heard. You were behind it, after all. And since we both know that story, it’s not particularly interesting, is it?” She tilted her head. “Where did you get those scars on your back?”

Sherlock blinked, knowing his face betrayed all the confusion he felt, but he hadn’t expected this. He hadn’t seen this coming. 

“I...” he shook his head again, feeling quite dumbstruck. “Was forcibly acquainted with a crow bar.”

She seemed to briefly wince at that, but Sherlock couldn’t have been sure if that was his imagination or not.

“Some of those look like whip marks to me. I _would_ know, after all.” she spoke with a small smile, but there was a depth of concern in her expression that spoke more than her words did. Sherlock briefly wondered what expression she would wear if he _did_ tell her just where these scars had come from, how badly they’d hurt, and how his brother had watched it happen.

He straightened his posture and stiffened his jaw.

“ _Why_ are you here?” he asked again, and this time his voice was solid and certain.

“I wanted to thank you.”  
  
Sherlock turned around abruptly and shut the running water off, standing up straight he took two long steps toward Irene and brushed past her to the bathroom door. Opening it, desperately needing to breathe, he fled to his bedroom. His eyes slid shut as he let the cool air assault his steam slicked skin for a moment, before turning back around to see The Woman staring at him, eyes wide and face grave.

“You’ve said it.” he said in a low grumble. “Now get out.”

Irene stared at him silently for a moment, looking quite sad.

“Is this really where we are?” She asked. “After all these years?”

Sherlock bit his bottom lip, looking away from her and up for a moment, before settling his gaze back on hers.

“Irene.” he began, and his tone was still and low. Pleading. His jaw shook as he tried to form words and gestured helplessly at the bedroom door. Sherlock of a year ago could have handled this. Sherlock of yesterday could have even handled this. Sherlock, perhaps, even of tomorrow could handle this… But Sherlock, at this moment, in the state that he was in, just… couldn’t. “Please.” He clenched his eyes closed for a moment. “Please, leave.”

A beat.

“What did the email say?”  
  
Sherlock slumped. True to form, she must have been here before he or even Mycroft arrived. She must have heard their whole damn conversation.  
  
But then, something in her expression, something about the way she was breathing, something about her demeanor made one fact very evident to him…  
  
“I would tell you,” he started, tilting his head suspiciously. “But you’ve already read it.”  
  
Irene swallowed.  
  
“Big Brother never was very thorough.”

* * *

 

**  
Islamabad**

**4 years Earlier**

 

Sherlock alighted from his car and shook hands with the man who awaited his arrival on the tarmac – a private jet prepped for his departure to Russia where he’d board a plane as Sherlock Holmes and head back to London.  
  
“Ms. Adler is safe?” He asked, wasting no time.  
  
“Ms. Adler is safe,” the man assured him. “The particular cell that captured her has been contained, and a body has been procured exactly to your specifications. If all goes well, and I see no reason why all should not go well, news of her beheading should reach a certain other Mr. Holmes in about a month’s time.”

“How did she get out of the country undetected?” Sherlock inquired in a grave tone, beginning toward his jet. The man followed. 

“We were unable to gather many specifics of how she managed it, but we know she left by train. And she left this-” here he took an envelope out from his jacket pocket and handed it to sherlock. “--In a safety deposit box in your name.”  
  
Sherlock took the envelope without looking at it and placed it in his own jacket pocket before making it to the bottom of the steps that would lead him to the entrance of his plane. He stopped before ascending and looked the man in the eyes.  
  
“Moriarty’s reach extends far beyond England, or this country. Far beyond either of us.”  
  
The man nodded in understanding.  
  
“I am ready to begin. I will do what I must.” he responded seriously.  
  
Sherlock looked around and took a deep breath.  
  
“We’ve already begun.” he spoke, and then looked back at the man. “I trust you’ll take it from here.”  
  
The man bowed, and Sherlock disappeared up the steps and in to the plane.

 

**…**

 

Sherlock at quietly in his plane seat, looking out through the window at the runway as it fell beneath him. He closed his eyes as he was unable, for a moment, to bear the sight of leaving this place behind without having seen The Woman one last time. He’d come all this way and had risked so much to do what she’d asked him to do. To find her. And what had he done? He’d hurt her. He’d disappointed her. And now he was abandoning her.  
  
No.

He opened his eyes, and grit his teeth. No, he _would_ watch as this awful place disappeared from view. He’d watch as it faded away beneath the clouds. He wasn’t abandoning her. She left _him_. She’d known the risks of leaving on her own, and she’d done it anyway, and had somehow got away completely by her own skill. She may have even purposely left her fake passport as a message. She didn’t need Sherlock. She had never needed Sherlock. 

Never.

He’d done what he had meant to do. He retrieved her from the clutches of the terrorist cell. He’d seen to it that the narrative that reached England and his brother – but most importantly that reached Moriarty – would cut off right as she’d been captured. He’d seen to it that there was a body. He’d seen to it that “Irene Adler” was dead. Whatever she became now was completely up to her… Whether he liked it or not.

“You think I really meant it?”  
  
Sherlock turned to the empty seat beside him, and wasn’t surprised at all to see The Woman looking at him with wide, deceptively innocent eyes.

“I think you know how to get what you want.” He responded quietly… Though maybe he didn’t say it aloud. She wasn’t really there to hear him, after all.

“You must think really low of me if you believe that I would tell a man I loved him just to get something I wanted.”

“On the contrary, I think rather highly of you for it.”

The empty seat smirked.

“But you can’t believe that I meant it?”  
  
Sherlock turned back toward the window.  
  
“I hope you didn’t.”  
  
“Why?”  
  
“Because I hurt you on purpose, and now I’ll never see you again. Seems like a bad place to leave it if you were telling the truth, don’t you think?”

“I did leave you a letter that you are quite pointedly refusing to read at the moment.”

Sherlock rotated his jaw.  
  
“I’m not refusing. I’m...” he paused. “Well, I’m refusing, yes.”  
  
“Aren’t you curious?”  
  
“I know what it says.”  
  
“But how can you be sure if you don’t look?”  
  
“I know you.” He bit down at the mistake. This wasn’t _her._ S _he_ wasn’t here.

The seat next to him was empty and had been empty this whole time.

Sherlock pulled out the envelope from his jacket in spite of itself and only hesitated for a moment before tearing it open and pulling the small piece of paper out and unfolding it. He scanned the short message once, and then twice, and then laughed – genuinely, for the first time in months.

He read the letter one more time to himself.

  
  
_Dear Mr. Holmes,_

_Sorry about dinner._

_\- IA_

 

... One single red kiss mark at the bottom of the nearly empty page for good measure.  
  
_Now_ that, he thought proudly, _is my_ _girl_.

* * *

**  
Baker Street**

**2 January, 2015**

She’d read the email. Of course she’d read the email.

Sherlock took a deep breath in and then let it back out before sitting heavily on the edge of his bed, burying his face in his hands out of pure exhaustion. When he raised his head back to look at The Woman she hadn't moved and her expression hadn't really changed.

"I wouldn't have written a word of it if--"

"If you didn't think you were going to die?" She interrupted, and when he said nothing to deny the fact, she went on. "Oh, I know how you operate. I know that nothing short of a death sentence or a threat to John Watson could have pulled that confession from you."

"What does John have to do with anything?"

"You woke up loving 3 people this morning..." she responded, searching his eyes. "John's long since been number one on that list, but judging by the conversation you just had with your brother, and the way you're looking at me now, he might be the only person on that list when you wake up tomorrow."

Sherlock swallowed.

"I didn't wake up this morning," he said in a cryptic monotone, grabbing hold of the one thing he knew how to respond to.

"But I _am_ right."

"I don't..." he shook his head slightly. "I don't know."

"Sherlock Holmes doesn't know?"

"Sherlock Holmes." he spat as he stood suddenly. " _Sherlock Holmes_. Everyone in the world seems to know who I am, or who I’m supposed to be, or what I know, or how I operate. Well, why don’t you tell me all about it, Ms. Adler, or whatever the hell your name is these days. Why don’t you tell me who I am? Because I _don’t_ know. The fact of the matter is that I see, I observe, I listen, I absorb, and I calculate.” he seemed to slice through the air rigidly with his hand as he spoke those words. “I can tell you how many breaths you’ve taken in the last 30 seconds, how nervous you are, and that despite your show of carelessness in the bathroom, I can tell you that you haven’t stopped shaking since you first spoke to me. What do these things tell _me_? They don’t _tell_ me anything. I come to my own conclusions based on observation and experience. And sometimes I’m wrong, Irene, because I don’t _know_. I don’t know why you’re here, or what you feel, or how you think…” his voice caught and he could feel himself tremble.

“I don’t know why you told me you loved me,” he went on, his face drawn and feeling very heavy. “And then went off to get married to the first person who wasn’t me anyway.”

Irene had gone somewhat pale, and her eyes glittered brilliantly.

“There are a lot of reasons to get married, Sherlock. Some of them have nothing to do with love.”

Sherlock pressed his lips together and nodded.

“I suppose you don’t love your child, either?”

“I got married for my child.”

Sherlock said nothing; hearing “my child” from her mouth was a bit too much for him to respond to.

“I can take care of myself. I’ve always been able to do that,” she continued, stepping closer to him, though he took a step back so that nothing was gained or lost. “But I couldn’t protect a child on my own. I needed help. I needed security.” she paused, swallowing tears, but hardening her face. “I thought you were dead for two years, and then when you weren’t anymore, I thought...”  
  
She shook her head.  
  
Sherlock blinked and just stood there, struck and silent and still before bringing his hands to his face and running them down his mouth. He let out a short, very unhappy laugh, cocking his head just a bit and correcting his posture – somehow regaining a composure that had failed him for the majority of this night.  
  
“I have nothing more to say to you that wasn’t in that email.” he said almost callously, and his tone was devoid of feeling. “Which, I believe, included ‘goodbye.’”

“It included a lot of things.”

“I won’t deny that I meant what I wrote when I wrote it, but considering the circumstances I’m certain it would be in our best interests to put it behind us. You have a family, and I have my work. You and I, whatever it was that we had, was coming to an end one way or another. It’s just that now I have to live through it.”

“You would rather die than have to face up to your own emotions. Spoken like a true Holmes.”

Sherlock’s mouth pulled back in to a crooked grin that didn’t meet his eyes.  
  
“If there is one thing my brother and I agree on, it’s that love is weakness.”

_A chemical defect found on the losing side..._

“You must know I can see through this. I _read_ your email. You can’t hide--”  
  
“I’m not hiding.” he cut her off and held out his arms wide from his bare chest for a moment as though to demonstrate that his statement were true. “What possible motivation could I have for concealing anything from you now? Any damage I could have been dealt has already been done.”

“And what damage is that?”

Sherlock moved his head back incredulously, almost as though to laugh, his forehead furrowing.

“You broke my heart.” he admitted easily, and there was none of the usual accompanying fear or panic; he was in no danger of letting anything slip that Irene didn’t already know, and he was in no danger of experiencing any further pain. There was nothing that could hurt more than this – loving someone that made him hate himself.

The Woman was silent for a moment.  
  
“You broke mine first.”  
  
_Not you, Junior, you’re done now._  
  
Sherlock smiled ironically.  
  
“Did you really come all this way to argue over who hurt who more? Because while we’re being honest with each other, I should admit that I’m not exactly feeling up to the task.”

Irene took in a deep breath, her face changing.

“I came here because if Moriarty is back, I’m not safe, and neither is my daughter.”

_Married. Daughter. Family._

“You came to ask for my help?” Sherlock asked as though the notion were ridiculous. “Well, allow me to put your fears to rest. Jim Moriarty shot himself in the head, and in my admittedly limited experience, blowing a hole through ones forehead commonly seems to result in death.”  
  
“How can you be sure?”  
  
“He shot himself in front of me.” he said firmly, bordering on angrily. “I saw him die with my own eyes.”  
  
“And you jumped off a building, and I was beheaded.” she responded pointedly. “Yet here we are.”

“That was different, that was...”

“Planned? Orchestrated? With enough people, enough time, enough resources, _anything_ can be faked. Anyone can be fooled. Even you. And that _I_ know from experience.”

Sherlock looked away from her at that, but she closed the distance between them – taking his face between her hands and forcing him to face her again.

“If it were just me, if I only had myself to worry about, I’d just run. I’m good at disappearing… But it’s not just me. I need to know that I can count on you.”  
  
Sherlock closed his eyes briefly, reaching up to hold her left hand against his face – her wedding ring against the skin of his fingers sending immediate and piercing pain through his heart.

And then, because he loved her, he kissed her.

It had been years, lifetimes, since he had felt her lips against his, but it was everything, _everything_ , he’d remembered it to be. Everything that kept his heart from shattering while he was away dismantling Moriarty’s network. Everything that he dreamt about. Everything that he missed. Everything that he had always been too afraid to admit he wanted. This was it. The Woman. _The_ Woman.

Her arms were around his neck, and his hands were tangled in her hair, and she was married, and God that hurt, but she was kissing him, her tongue and lips against his – demanding more and more, and she was married, _for God’s sake_ , he was still high, his head was swimming, and she was unbuttoning his trousers, and she was married, and _please God just make this pain go away_ , but he was pulling her dress up and over her head, and he loved her so much, and she knew it, and there was nothing to hide, and she was his, but she was married, and he was pushing her back toward the bed, and all he wanted – all he _needed_ was her body and her mouth and her breath and _her_ , all he needed was all of her, and he was going to have her.

Married or not.

Somehow they were on the bed, and there were tangled limbs, and underclothes were being shed, and they were pressed skin to skin, and pain and heartache gave way to lust and want, and he _did_ want her. She was the only woman he had ever wanted. She cried out his name as he quickly trailed openmouthed kisses from between her breasts all the way down to her abdomen, and he loved the sound. How had he done without that sound for so long? How had he managed to live without this woman for all these years? The rest of the world was falling away, and this was all that mattered. 

He gripped her thighs in his hands and parted her legs and pressed his mouth and tongue against her, reveling in the new sensations, the sounds of The Woman moaning loudly in to the quiet room, the feel of her hands gripping his hair and pulling him in… And was this really happening?  
  
This morning he was being permanently parted from everyone and everything he’d ever loved or cared about, but now…

“Sherlock!” Irene let out a strangled cry of pleasure.

He followed her lead, listened to her cues, moved his tongue with her hips, applied pressure when she pushed, relented when she shuddered. It wasn’t long before her thighs were tightening around his head, and she trembled around him – breathing erratic, pulse pounding in the wrist that he’d somehow caught between his two fingers and thumb.

_I took your pulse._

He closed his eyes against the memory, and then pushed himself back up the length of Irene’s body so that his face was very near hers. She was flushed and beautiful, and he just…

“I love you.” He said quietly, and her chest seemed to still in surprise for a moment before continuing its hurried rise and fall.

A slow smile spread across her face before she pulled him down for a long, languorous kiss… And he was absolutely hers. She had him. He knew that he would do it all over – relive every single painful, gut-wrenching, stomach churning moment just to have this one more time. Just to end up here in her arms, with her mouth against his. He could be Sherlock Holmes, whatever that meant, outside this moment and outside this room, but here and now he was no one and she was no one, but they were together. 

So, no. It had not all been for nothing. It had been for _this_.  
  
She would be gone in the morning. He’d tangle himself in her all night, and he’d love her because he was finally ready to love her and she was ready to let him, and he’d be no one with her until exhaustion overtook them both and real life came flooding back in to their small contained little world here in this bed – here with each other… But he knew when the sun came up, that she would not be here. She couldn’t stay. She could never stay, and he hurt a little at the thought, but he wouldn’t let it overwhelm him yet. That moment could wait. The pain could wait.  
  
She’d come to him like this once before. Years before. She’d shown up unexpectedly and had singlehandedly changed his life forever… He hadn’t been so willing that night to offer aid or protection, and he’d spent so much time afterward hating her for asking, but this night would be different. This time she would leave here knowing that Sherlock Holmes loved her, and that yes… She could count on him for the rest of her life.

* * *

 

**London**

**3 May, 2012**

 

“Are you expecting me to beg?” the tearful woman asked incredulously as she watched Sherlock walk toward the door.  
  
“Yes,” he answered without a beat of hesitation, coming to a stop, venom laced in the word.

There was only a moment’s silence before:

“Please,” she said quietly. “You’re right.”  
  
He looked at her blankly, only his eyes revealing the seething hatred he felt toward her in this moment. Yes, he was right. He had thought earlier that one or both of them would end up in pieces before the night was through, and here they were. He had won, because she had been careless. She fell in love with the one man who could never love her back, the one man who could look at her now as she cried and begged for mercy… and feel nothing.

“I won’t last 6 months.” she finished.

Sherlock raised his forehead callously, and chose his next words as carefully as though he were composing a piece of music.

“Sorry about dinner.”

**…**

 

It had just started to rain as Sherlock unceremoniously exited his brother's posh home, leaving behind the older Holmes and Irene Adler to what was probably a very tedious conversation, though one his brother likely relished at that. He'd been just a hair's breadth away from crushing defeat. They both had been.

It was an eleventh hour victory, certainly, but a victory nonetheless.

Something of a victory anyway.

Sherlock pulled his collar up against the cold and the damp, and walked, what may have appeared to an observer as, absently down the street. It briefly occurred to him to hail a cab, but the rain didn't bother him, and anyway...

He wasn't in a hurry to get home.

**…**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I had a few alternate endings, including one where Irene Adler was dead. I also had a much longer Karachi plot, but the chapter was at about 2k words, and I decided to cut it, because in the end I wanted this story to be about Sherlock and his journey of discovering who he really is... As cheesy as that sounds. 
> 
> I hope you enjoyed reading this as much as I enjoyed writing it! So, in the immortal words of one William Sherlock Scott Holmes...
> 
> Laterz!


	16. Sherlock's Letter to Irene

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I thought I'd put the whole email in one place. :)

Irene,

The last time I was presented with the inescapable necessity of disappearing for a long while, I didn't explain the situation to you. Looking back now, I believe it was because I didn't feel that I owed you an explanation. I also wasn't certain you would want one. I didn't want to know that you wouldn't.

This time, however, I realise that I've always owed you an explanation. And while it comes late, too late, it is my hope that it offers you the insight you deserve.

The truth is, I've never loved anyone more than I've loved you. I've thought countless times of countless different ways to say it, but the simplest way is often the best way. Or so I've heard. Regardless of whether that's true or not, the fact remains the same.

I love you.

I never expected to fall in love, so that when it actually happened, I couldn't see it at first for what it was. Then, of course, when it became clear to me that I'd fallen pray to a sentiment that I'd always believed to be at best useless, and at worst, destructive, it terrified me in a way that I can only imagine someone who has just flipped his car in to oncoming traffic must feel. Which is to say, it didn't appear to me that there was any clear resolution, least of which one that would not be horribly and disfiguringly painful.  

My body has always been second to my mind, my emotional life to my work. I had succeeded for so long in ignoring that part of myself that experiencing it for the first time, for the only time, was like seeing a new colour that had always been just slightly off the spectrum. Can you imagine a new colour? I can't, and I couldn't imagine love. It was a new sense, a new structure in my mind's landscape.

You were an anomaly, and one cannot trust anomalies... and so I didn't trust you.

I would ask for your forgiveness if I didn't think you would give it to me, but I know that you would. In the same way I'd forgiven you for faking your own death, for lying to me for months, and for nearly leaving me to the wolves when it came time. I'd forgiven you almost the moment the circumstances became clear, and if I ask you to do the same for me now, you will. For the same reason I forgave you.

But I won't ask you. You once wrote to me that it was always too late for us, and perhaps had I not been so hell bent on making sure it were true, it may not have been. I had you in my arms, and I had you in my grasp. I had you. And now I don't.

If I were the type to pity myself, this might well be the point where I would point out several of my innate flaws and wallow in the euphoria of self-loathing... But I'm not that type, and besides that is not the point of this letter.

By now you've no doubt heard from some source or another of what I've done.

Given that likelihood, I'm sure you understand what I am saying to you, and why I am saying it. I'm sorry. I'm sorry for all the ways I hurt you, and for all the ways I let you go when I didn't have to... But more than that, I'm sorry for only now understanding you. I understand the importance of your camera phone and the protection I took away from you. I understand how frightened you must have been when I left you standing there with my brother on your last night in London.

And I know now what I should have done. When you were texting me and were still within my reach and my scope, instead of ignoring you, instead of ignoring myself...

When you asked to meet me for dinner...  
I should have said, "Tell me where."

That I never replied to you, however, is not my main regret.  I couldn't have replied. You paralyzed me. I couldn't read you, and I couldn't analyse you, as I'd had no previous experience to compare your actions against. I was unable, through the texts you sent, to gain any kind of insight in to you or your motives, and anything I would have replied with would have been too telling. I was unwilling to hand you information about me when all I really knew about you was your phone number. That's just me, and you always knew that.

My main regret, Ms Adler, is Islamabad. 

I won't go in to the details, for several reasons, not the least of which being I am on something of a time limit, but also because you were there. If I speak of regret, I have no doubt that you understand to what I am referring. And it doesn't matter. I can't wave my hand and make it so that it never happened or so that the words were never said.

Only one thing matters now. I want you to know that you've never left me since that night in my bedroom. You were with me when I fell. You were with me when I was dying, and you were with me when I was dead. Through everything, you've been there, whispering, saying hello, saying goodnight, saying goodbye. You're with me now. You'll be with me when I'm gone. I believe there is a poem that expresses this sentiment in far greater detail and eloquence than I ever could, so I'll leave the overly sentimental prose to the poet... But I want you to know, at least, that I mean it.

Though now, I have only one favor to ask of you. The first and the last.

All I ask is that you do not carry me with you the way that I have carried you with me. Ms Adler, that is one thing I would not wish on anyone - least of all the person who has earned the unfortunate distinction of being the only woman I have ever loved.

All I ask is that you let me go.

I can't help but feel as though we've been at odds and at war since I first rang the doorbell in Belgravia. A war of attrition, Ms Adler, in which you've worn through my reserves and my resolve, and put me through the only hell I could ever believe in. You've brought me to my knees in more ways than one, and I know that I am beaten. Now, when I should hate you for it, I can only wonder at the whole affair. I've regretted you almost as long as I've known you, but time has worn through that as well. Now I can only appreciate having had the opportunity to be made a better man... Even if I didn't take it.

So, you see, I am not worth missing or regretting. If you should ever feel any particular inclination toward either of those emotions in regards to me, please know that those duties will be particularly well taken care of by John and Mary Watson who, unfortunately for them, will not be sent an email talking them out of it.

Irene, you were amongst the most formidable opponents I've ever encountered, and you've afforded me a remarkable adventure. I'd offer my gratitude if I were that kind of man - but instead I offer you my respect. And all my love.

Goodbye, Ms Adler.

SH

**Author's Note:**

> In the DVD commentary for ASiB, Moffat made a joke about how Irene's hair in the Coventry conversation scene was her "not evil hair", and I liked it so much I had to have Sherlock say it. :)
> 
> The next chapter is going to pick up a little differently, but I'm jumping around the timeline of Sherlock and Irene's relationship quite a bit in this story. I don't think linearly, so I don't write that way either!


End file.
